Lina Khan: Last News

An increasingly aggressive Federal Trade Commission will sue to block a proposed $69 billion merger between Microsoft and leading video game developer Activision Blizzard announced early this year. It said the deal would hand the tech giant and Xbox maker too much control of top videogame franchises, “enabling it to harm competition in high-performance gaming consoles and subscription services by denying or degrading rivals’ access to its popular content.”

Americans can see the price of live event tickets upfront as the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) banned “junk fees.”

Donald Trump has appointed Andrew Ferguson to serve as the next chair of the Federal Trade Commission, which has a major say over mergers and acquisitions.

Gail Slater, an aide to JD Vance and former staff attorney at the Federal Trade Commission and former Fox Corp. executive, has been nominated to lead the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division in Donald Trump‘s upcoming term.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Donald Trump‘s return to the White House next year could lead to a new wave of industry consolidation in the media and entertainment biz — and beyond. A second Trump administration is likely to usher in deregulation and “more aggressive M&A activity,” said Lucinda Guthrie, head of financial data company Mergermarket.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor The Federal Trade Commission on Tuesday issued a final rule banning noncompete clauses in employment contracts in the U.S. But experts in the field said the FTC‘s move will definitely be challenged in court. Under the FTC’s new rule, if it goes into effect, existing noncompete agreements for the “vast majority” of workers will no longer be enforceable.

Zack Sharf Digital News Director Jon Stewart made headlines in February when he appeared on “CBS Mornings” ahead of his return to hosting Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show” and said that Apple canceled his previous talk show, “The Problem With Jon Stewart,” because “they didn’t want me to say things that might get me in trouble.” On the April 1 episode of “The Daily Show,” Stewart went into greater detail about Apple’s concerns over the direction of his now-axed talk show and corresponding podcast. Stewart was interviewing Federal Trade Commission chair Lina Khan on “The Daily Show” and told her that he once pitched to have her as a guest on “The Problem” podcast.

Last month, the U.S. Justice Department and more than a dozen state attorneys general sued Apple, claiming that the tech giant has an illegal monopoly over the smartphone market and warning that Apple’s monopoly on smartphones could extend to other areas of the economy, including entertainment.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor The Federal Trade Commission filed an antitrust lawsuit against Amazon, alleging that the ecommerce and technology giant is a monopolist that “uses a set of interlocking anticompetitive and unfair strategies to illegally maintain its monopoly power.” Among the accusations, the FTC’s lawsuit, which was joined by 17 state attorneys general, allege that Amazon’s actions allow it to stop rivals and sellers from lowering prices; degrade quality for shoppers; overcharge sellers; stifle innovation; and prevent rivals from fairly competing against Amazon. The lawsuit — which has been brewing over the last several months — seeks a permanent injunction in U.S.

The Joe Biden-era Federal Trade Commission and the Justice Department have a mixed record in the courts when it comes to fighting mergers, but proposed new guidelines signal a continued effort to slow or block corporate consolidation.

Epic Games has agreed to pay a total of $520 million in two settlements with the Federal Trade Commission over allegations the Fortnite creator violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, and that it used design tricks to dupe millions of players into making unintentional purchases.

Twitter has agreed to pay a $150 million to the Federal Trade Commission for what its chief privacy officer Damien Kieran called “a privacy incident” when email addresses and phone numbers users provided for account security purposes “may have been inadvertently used for advertising.”

The Senate confirmed Alvaro Bedoya to the Federal Trade Commission, giving Democrats a working majority at the agency as it sets its sights on reining in the tech industry and giving proposed mergers and acquisitions much greater scrutiny.

The Senate narrowly advanced the nomination of Alvaro Bedoya to the Federal Trade Commission, as Democrats seek to end a deadlock on the commission and advance an agenda likely to take a harder line on corporation consolidation and tech giants.

The Writers Guild of America West and a coalition of unions launched another salvo against Amazon-MGM, urging antitrust watchdog, the Federal Trade Commission, to contest the deal even though it officially closed last week.

Amazon has won unconditional EU antitrust approval for its $8.5 billion acquisition of storied U.S. movie studio MGM, the European Commission said Tuesday.

Microsoft purchase of Activision Blizzard is causing concern for smaller game developersLast month it was announced that Microsoft was acquiring Activision Blizzard for around £50billion, followed by news at the end of January that Sony would buy Bungie for £2.6billion.Now multiple indie developers have spoken to the BBC about their concerns with the Microsoft acquisition, and what it could mean for them.Director at Kitfox Games Tanya Short – the developer of Boyfriend Dungeon – said: “This Activision acquisition strikes fear in us because it makes it so much more obvious – maybe they could dominate the rest of the year and then what do we do?”“Conceivably, indie games outside of these services might lose engagement as subscribers focus most of their attention on games they can access for free within the service,” adds Yura Zhdanovich, founder and director at Sad Cat Studios.The Federal Trade Commission is set to investigate the deal and whether or not it would harm the competition. FTC Chair Lina Khan is an advocate for a more assertive approach when handling deals.

Microsoft is to be investigated by the Federal Trade Commission over their proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard.News broke last month that Call of Duty and Overwatch developers Activision Blizzard were being acquired by Microsoft. But the deal isn’t actually set in stone yet, and now according to Bloomberg, the deal will see the FTC conduct an antitrust investigation over the Activision Blizzard acquisition.

The Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice are launching plans to update and modernize merger enforcement guidelines, something that could mean closer scrutiny of major tech and media transactions.