Tech companies are the modern day US business giants

THE ECHO's report (29/10/25) outlining the extent of abuse and intimidation present on social media platforms, and highlighting the concerns of the cross-party group of MPs who are the subject of online vitriol and threats, charts their reservations that Meta and X have any genuine intentions of moderating content 'unless they are legally obliged to do so.

- Frank Rice

Donald Trump

(AP PHOTO/NG HAN GUAN)

Anybody placing their faith in social media corporations doing the decent thing will need more than rosary beads or divine intervention.

The self same tech companies that bankrolled Donald Trump's election campaign are now inextricably bound into government and their narrow sectional interests have become the national interest of the US, which means that any foreign country with notions of exercising a moderating influence or encouraging restraint on these behemoths will have Donald Trump to contend with.

Meta and its counterparts are now the digital equivalent of the oil, mining and tobacco conglomerates of the analogue era.