The Senate Judiciary Committee has moved its scheduled markup of a tough new online antitrust bill from Thursday (Jan. 13) to Jan. 27.

The bill, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act, was introduced back in October by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), chair of the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee and a self-described leading antitrust reformer, and Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), the ranking member. It‘s one of many proposed bills to rein in Big Tech, and not the only one backed by Klobuchar.

Also: CCIA Study Asserts Edge Regs Could Be $300 Billion Economic Hit

The American Innovation and Choice Online Act would do the following:

CCIA members include Amazon and Google, both of which are clearly in the bill‘s sights. 

“Gerrymandering regulations around a handful of leading businesses will skew competition and leave consumers worse off,” he said, adding: “By hamstringing successful U.S. tech companies without even imposing corresponding obligations on foreign rivals, this shortsighted legislation will put the data and security of U.S. users at risk.”

Consumer Technology Association president Gary Shapiro has said the bill would do irreparable harm to U.S. companies, including by putting them at a disadvantage to China and other nations. “The bill allocates vast new powers to the FTC, allowing the commission to ignore the consumer-welfare standard, while imposing massive fines with minimal due process,” Shapiro said.

The bill allows civil penalties of up to 15% of U.S. revenue for the duration of the violation and authorizes a court to penalize a CEO or corporate officer an amount equal to their compensation for the 12 months preceding or following a complaint. ■

A trio of Arkansas Republicans has asked FCC chair Ajit Pai to give network providers a "reasonable transition period" before adopting a new, dregulatory, broadband businesses data services (BDS) proposal the FCC is voting on April 20.

That came in a letter to the chairman from Sens. John Boozman and Tom Cotton and Rep. French Hill.

They told Pai that while they support his efforts to "identify and eliminate unnecessary rules and regulations" and to modernize telecom nets, they also want him to buffer the "potential disruptions" and "unintended consequences" on small businesses (competitive carriers) of deregulating rates for incumbent, large, players like AT&T and CenturyLink.

They argue that a transition period would create a "window" for planning for price increases or purchasing IP-enabled equipment--the proposal is looking to speed the transition to IP-based services, they point out.

They did not say how long a transition period they wanted, but did note that wireless 5g deployments targeted for 2020 "may serve to hold prices in check despite the highly concentrated ownership of BDS facilities [by the incumbents,  former Bells who built out as regulated monopolies]. They also said a transition runway would allow providers to educate consumers about "the coming changes," including "price hikes" and "termination of service."

The use of terms like "hike" for prices, and "disruptions" and "highly concentrated ownership" had more of the flavor of a Democratic letter than one from Pai's own party.

The Small Business Administration's advocacy office has also called for an "adjustment period" to the new regs, though it also called for a delay of the vote.