“La perdita di gettito fiscale per lo stato a causa del fatto che le multinazionali digitali erogano all’estero beni e servizi digitali sul mercato nazionale, è quindi solo un epifenomeno di una più radicale trasformazione in atto, che ha un potenziale di interferenza senza precedenti nell’informazione, nelle relazioni sociali e nell’economia”.
The antitrust laws conceived in the last century are not suitable to the modern digital society and the time of reaction of legislators is not slow to catch up with new unanticipated behaviours or means to sidesteps them.
A complete redesign of regulations for the digital age is needed, but as also Quintarelli notices, this would require a change of mind in the public opinion.
Instead the population has been lulled by the apparent benefits of free services in exchange of giving away their minds in a faustian exchange.
When Google announces it is opening two datacenters in Italy, the prime minister Conte expresses appraisal: he does not see that if Google had paid its due taxes, he would have had even more money to invest in building his own datacenters, creating infrastructure and valuable assets (CAPEX), instead of keeping spending (OPEX) and increasing Google profit. The infrastructures, that Italy desperately needs, would also have had a multiplicative effect produced by the value produced by its users and the competences that would be created.
We have become addicted and accomplices.
--
Schaake: How do you reflect on the difference in speed between technological innovations and democratic lawmaking? Some people imply this will give authoritarian regimes an advantage in setting global standards and rules. What are your thoughts on ensuring democratic governments speed up?
Tisné: Democracies cannot afford to be outpaced by technological innovation and constantly be fighting yesterday?s wars. Our laws have not changed to reflect changes in technology, which extracts value from collective data, and need to catch up. A lot of the problems stem from the fact that in government (as in companies), the people responsible for enforcement are separated from those with the technical understanding. The solution lies in much better translation between technology, policy and the needs of the public.