The president tried to rally bipartisan help to lastly resolve quite a few long-standing privateness, security, and competitors points going through the tech business. Over the greater than hourlong tackle, Biden referred to as on Congress to go new guidelines defending person knowledge privateness and boosting competitors within the tech business.

“Move bipartisan laws to strengthen antitrust enforcement and stop large on-line platforms from giving their very own merchandise an unfair benefit,” Biden mentioned. “It’s time to go bipartisan laws to cease Huge Tech from amassing private knowledge on youngsters and youngsters on-line, ban focused promoting to kids, and impose stricter limits on the non-public knowledge these corporations acquire on all of us.”

The tackle echoed a lot of what Biden mentioned throughout his first State of the Union tackle final 12 months. Baby on-line security has lengthy troubled Congress and the Biden administration, reaching dramatic highs in 2021 after Fb whistleblower Frances Haugen leaked inner firm paperwork detailing the psychological well being dangers younger customers face when utilizing Meta platforms like Instagram. Haugen attended the president’s final tackle as a visitor of First Woman Jill Biden, a testomony to the administration’s want for stricter on-line protections. 

However over the past two years, little has been carried out to enhance the protection of younger customers on social media within the US. Lawmakers have launched dozens of payments, however none have garnered sufficient help to pressure a flooring vote in both the Home or Senate. Many of those payments, like Sens. Ed Markey (D-MA) and Josh Hawley’s (R-MO) measure to replace a standing on-line baby security regulation, do a lot of what Biden requested for Tuesday, like banning platforms like Instagram and YouTube from focusing on advertisements to minors. 

Biden touted his administration’s work to bolster US competitiveness towards China, leveraging the primetime spot to tout the $52 billion CHIPS and Science Act that included $52 billion in funding to spice up US semiconductor manufacturing. Regardless of the speech’s give attention to China, Biden didn’t touch upon whether or not his administration would ban TikTok.

“I’ll make no apologies that we’re investing to make America robust,” Biden mentioned. “Investing in American innovation, in industries that may outline the longer term, and that China’s authorities is intent on dominating.”