America first, Korea second? How Trump impacts Korea's fight against Big Tech
Published: 21 Jan. 2025, 06:00
-
- CHO YONG-JUN
- [email protected]
![Apple CEO and U.S. President Donald Trump in 2019 [REUTERS/YONHAP]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/01/21/fce6eee6-910f-4c1f-95fe-0eb1f770d1a2.jpg)
Apple CEO and U.S. President Donald Trump in 2019 [REUTERS/YONHAP]
The Korean antitrust watchdog's plans to regulate Naver, Google, Apple and Kakao may run into problems with the new Trump administration in the United States, as it could conflict with the America First policy of the new President.
Korea’s Fair Trade Commission (FTC) released amendments to the Monopoly Regulation and Fair Trade Act in September granting the agency the power to temporarily halt the business of platforms suspected of anticompetitive practices.
The regulation was expected to target Google, Apple, Naver and Kakao specifically, as the FTC defined a monopoly as one platform with more than 100 million users controlling more than 60 percent of Korea's market or three or fewer companies, with more than 200 million users each, holding a market share of more than 85 percent.
Practices defined as anticompetitive included preferential treatment of a platform’s own companies, tie-in sales, restrictions on multihoming and demands for favorable management.
The threshold, which includes two U.S. firms, may collide with Trump’s “America First” policy. Jamieson Greer, Trump's nominee for United States trade representative, has previously raised concerns regarding the FTC’s move.
“Discrimination against U.S. firms is exactly what the proposed legislation would entail,” Greer wrote in Barron’s in January 2024, arguing that the FTC’s threshold subjected “U.S. companies to draconian regulatory controls” while leaving out Korean chaebol.
“Doubly concerning is the apparent exclusion of massive Chinese companies […] restricting market access and opportunities for U.S. companies, while allowing Chinese digital giants to grow their footprint in Korea, would raise concerns over fair competition and even national security,” he wrote.
When — and if — the legislation passes the National Assembly and U.S. firms are sanctioned, the U.S. government could strike back with sanctions. Republican Rep. Carol Miller of West Virginia, in particular, introduced the U.S.- Republic of Korea Digital Trade Enforcement Act, which would allow the U.S. government to use Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 as a countermeasure to “ensure that foreign countries do not impose discriminatory digital policies that disfavor United States companies.”
The probability of such a forecast, however, is more than just a big if, as the first Trump administration already tried to fight France and its attempt to impose a “digital services tax” on U.S. companies with $2.4 billion tariffs on French cheese and champagne.
Financial Times reported Jan. 14 that the European Union was “reassessing” investigations of Apple, Meta and Google to account for the upcoming Trump administration.
This, in turn, may make the Korean antitrust agency modify regulations to reduce possible trade confects, but Korea's Democratic Party (DP), which holds a majority in the National Assembly, has been calling for even stricter regulation. DP Rep. Kim Nam-geun previously argued that they should regulate “preemptively” and that regulation should include more firms.
“When the new regulations are to be applied to U.S. Big Tech firms, pressure from the U.S. government will also increase,” Korea University professor Lee Seong-yeob said. “More thoughtful lawmaking is required as it may, in return, cause Korean firms to be discriminated [against].”
A person related to the FTC said the agency is “pursuing the direction as it was introduced in September” but added that it is “closely monitoring the trends of the upcoming U.S. administration.”
BY KIM MIN-JOONG, CHO YONG-JUN [[email protected]]
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
To write comments, please log in to one of the accounts.
Standards Board Policy (0/250자)