Chip Wars

David Kris opens this episode of the Cyberlaw Podcast by laying out some of the massive disruption that the Biden Administration has kicked off in China’s semiconductor industry—and its Western suppliers. The reverberations of the administration’s new measures will be felt for years, and the Chinese government’s response, not to mention the ultimate consequences, remains uncertain.

Richard Stiennon, our industry analyst, gives us an overview of the cybersecurity market, where tech and cyber companies have taken a beating but cybersecurity startups continue to gain funding. 

Mark MacCarthy reviews the industry from the viewpoint of the trustbusters. Google is facing what looks like a serious AdTech platform challenge from several directions—the EU, the Justice Department, and several states. Facebook, meanwhile, is lucky to be a target of the Federal Trade Commission, which rather embarrassingly had to withdraw claims that the acquisition of Within would remove an actual (as opposed to hypothetical) competitor from the market. No one seems to have challenged Google’s acquisition of Mandiant, meanwhile. Richard suspects that is because Google is not likely to do anything with the company. 

David walks us through the new White House national security strategy—and puts it in historical context. 

Mark and I cross swords over PayPal’s determination to take my money for saying things Paypal doesn’t like. Visa and Mastercard are less upfront about their ability to boycott businesses they consider beyond the pale, but all money transfer companies have rules of this kind, he says. We end up agreeing that transparency, the measure usually recommended for platform speech suppression, makes sense for Paypal and its ilk, especially since they’re already subject to extensive government regulation.  

Richard and I dive into the market for identity security. It’s hot, thanks to zero trust computing. Thoma Bravo is leading a rollup of identity companies. I predict security troubles ahead for the merged portfolio.  

In updates and quick hits:

• The Texas social media law is on hold again, but do not get excited. It is a  voluntary deal designed to speed Supreme Court consideration of a review petition. 
• Now Ukraine knows how Twitter feels: Elon Musk has changed his mind again. He will not be demanding that Department of Defense pay for the Starlink service Elon rolled out at the start of the war with Russia.
• After catching Google red-handed in what looks like ideological use of a spam filter, the GOP now appears to be overplaying its hand. 

And I predict much more coverage, not to mention prosecutorial attention, will result from accusations that a powerful partner at the establishment law firm, Dechert, engaged in hack-and-dox attacks on adversaries of his clients.