The world’s tech giants have a degree of independence and power that often supersedes even that of nations, and that is a security threat which must be tackled in some way, speakers at a Budapest fundamental rights conference said on Wednesday.
“Social media is a battlefield that one must enter and fight,” Miklós Szánthó, director of the Hungarian think-tank Center for Fundamental Rights (AK), said at the conference.
Keynote speaker Tamás Schanda, the state minister at the Information and Technology Ministry, said that the global tech giants have reached a level of power which was previously the exclusive domain of nations and that these de facto sovereign entities also pose a security risk that must be addressed.
Schanda said that currently there is nothing to counterbalance or keep in check that power, and it is also doubtful whether regulatory efforts will succeed. He said the position of the Hungarian state is unequivocal: Sovereignty is the sole domain of nations, which rests on the foundation of democracy stemming from a mandate given by the people.
In contrast, tech giants are establishing supranational, state-like entities with users as their subjects.
Both Szánthó and Schanda agreed that the likes of Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Apple have amassed an unprecedented amount of power which raises sovereignty and national security concerns.
Schanda said that much of that power comes from the fact that these companies control search results.
A recent study indicated that more than of the population over the age of 16 is keeping informed online while only 14 percent get their information from traditional media.
“Those who filter search results for us have the power,” Schanda said, referring to the above-mentioned tech giants, adding that the transparency of their operations is also in question.
József Horváth, security advisor for AK, said he was the only one among the participants of the conference who does not use Google services, as he believes this to be the only way to prevent it from selling personal data without our knowledge.
He added that one of the greatest challenges the Hungarian state will have in coming years is the protection of the databases containing information about its citizens.
