Apple (AAPL) CEO Tim Cook received a letter on Wednesday from U.S. Federal Trade Commission Chairman Andrew Ferguson that alleged political bias in the Apple News app feed could violate consumer protection laws.
In particular, Ferguson highlighted Section 5 of the FTC Act that prohibits unfair or deceptive acts or practices.
“Recently, there have been reports that Apple News has systematically promoted news articles from left-wing news outlets and suppressed news articles from more conservative publications,” Ferguson wrote. “Indeed, multiple studies have found in recent months Apple News has chosen not to feature a single article from an American conservative-leaning news source while simultaneously promoting hundreds of articles from liberal publications. These reports raise serious questions about whether Apple News is acting in accordance with its terms of service and its representations to consumers, as well as the reasonable consumer expectations of the tens of millions of Americans who use Apple News.”
One study Ferguson referenced was by the Media Research Center, a conservative watchdog group. The group analyzed 620 stories appearing in the Apple News feed during the high-traffic morning slots from January 1-31. Of those articles, 440 were rated as published by left-leaning news organizations, 180 stemmed from centrist news outlets, and none originated from right-leaning news firms, according to the study.
Ferguson stated in the letter that the First Amendment protects the speech of big tech firms, but it does not “immunize speakers from conduct that Congress has deemed unfair under the FTC Act, even if that conduct involves speech.”
“The FTC is not the speech police; we do not have authority to require Apple or any other firm to take affirmative positions on any political issue, nor to curate news offerings with one ideology or another,” he added. “But Congress has mandated that we protect consumers from material misrepresentations and omissions, including when the product or service offered to consumers is a speech-related product.”
Ferguson then asked Apple to conduct a review of its terms of service to ensure Apple News’ article selection matched those terms.
Seeking Alpha reached out to Apple for comment on this matter.
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