Open Markets makes statement on reintroduction of Protecting AI and Cloud Competition in Defense Act
The Open Markets Institute released the following statement from Dr. Courtney Radsch, Director of the Center for Journalism and Liberty at Open MArkets, on the reintroduction of the bipartisan Protecting AI and Cloud Competition in Defense Act by Senators Warren (D-MA) and Schmitt (R-MO).
A recent Open Markets report explicitly recommended governments take such measures to diversity procurement, among other recommendations for improving the reliability and competitiveness of our digital infrastructure.
“This legislation is a crucial step to address the dangerous concentration of cloud computing power that our recent report, 'Engineering the Cloud Commons,' identified as a major threat to our economic and national security." said Dr. Radsch. "When just three Big Tech corporation control two-thirds of global cloud capacity while receiving billions in government subsidies, we're creating single points of failure across our entire economy and governments. As we've seen with outages like CrowdStrike, this isn't just an abstract competition issue—it's about protecting vital services that power national defense and ensuing resiliency through robust competition. The bill's limits on AI contractors exploiting government data and reporting requirements on competitive dynamics are welcome safeguards.”
Open Markets’ new report "Engineering the Cloud Commons: A Blueprint for Resilient, Secure, and Open Digital Infrastructure" provides a comprehensive framework for regulating cloud computing as a public utility and in the public interest. The full report is available here.