Will Congress’ Latest Grilling of Big Tech Execs Finally Lead to Change?

Three of the biggest names in tech — Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and Google CEO Sundar Pichai — virtually testified before the U.S. Senate’s Commerce Committee on Wednesday. Predictably, the hearing went the way the other hearings featuring Silicon Valley executives have gone in recent years: Conservative politicians ripped the executives for censoring content, left-leaning politicians skewered them for not censoring enough and a few threats and potential legal updates were floated. But by the end, it felt like nothing had really changed or would change –similar to past Big Tech hearings. What brought us here? Wednesday’s hearing was primarily focused on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a 24-year-old law that gives tech giants the leeway to moderate content on their platforms.