‘Where is the Line Between Global Business & Attempts to Control Society?’ Putin asks Davos as He Calls Out Power of Big Tech
Thu 11:38 am +01:00, 28 Jan 2021
ER Editor: We also recommend this other RT report, titled Putin tells Davos that divided modern world facing ‘real breakdown’, with demographic struggles & echoes of 1930s pre-WW2 tensions. Of note:
Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned against the danger of repeating the mistakes leading up to World War II, noting that the modern world might break down as it struggles with the battle of “everyone against everyone.”
Putin was speaking at the Davos World Economic Forum, held remotely this year, in his first appearance at the prestigious meeting since 2009.
Putin also warned against the “destruction” of traditional values, as well as the right to choose and the right to a private life.
“The social and values crisis is already having negative demographic consequences, from which mankind is at risk of losing entire civilizational and cultural continents,” he said, stressing that it is a global responsibility to avoid this “gloomy dystopia.”
This is Putin’s first attendance at the World Economic Forum (held in Singapore virtually this year, not Davos) since 2009, and he doesn’t seem to be missing the opportunity to call out what’s going on globally.
Disclose TV has put a short section of his speech on Twitter:
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‘Where is the line between global business & attempts to control society?’ Putin asks Davos as he calls out power of Big Tech
RT
“Where is the line between a successful global business, in-demand services and consolidation of big data – and attempts to harshly and unilaterally govern society, replace legitimate democratic institutions, restrict one’s natural right to decide for themselves how to live, what to choose, what stance to express freely?” Putin wondered.
“We’ve all seen this just now in the US. And everybody understands what I’m talking about,” he added.
The Russian leader was apparently referring to the crackdown by Big Tech corporations like Twitter, Facebook, Google, Apple and Amazon, mostly on Donald Trump and his supporters, during the recent presidential election in the US. The companies, which, according to some critics, sided with Democratic candidate Joe Biden, blocked President Trump’s social media accounts over accusations of inciting violence, with the same being done to many pages of groups and individuals who’d backed him.
However, one-sided bias claim voiced by some might be an overestimation – the accounts of Democrats supporters were also subject to restrictions, but on a much smaller scale.
Conservative Twitter-like platform Parler was also forced offline, and now there are calls to block the Telegram app as well.
These events have shown that Big Tech companies “in some areas have de facto become rivals to the government,” Putin said.
Billions of users spend large parts of their lives on the platforms and, from the point of view of those companies, their monopolistic position is favorable for organizing economic and technological processes, the Russian president explained.
“But there’s a question of how such monopolism fits the interest of society,” he stressed.
