Don't be evil : the case against big tech

A TIMES BEST CURRENT AFFAIRS BOOK OF 2019An award-winning Financial Times columnist exposes the threat that Big Tech poses to our democracies, our economies and ourselvesToday Google and Facebook receive 90% of the world's news ad-spending. Amazon takes half of all ecommerce in the US. Google and Apple operating systems run on all but 1% of cell phones globally. And 80% of corporate wealth is now held by 10% of companies - not the GEs and Toyotas of this world, but the digital titans. How did we get here? How did the tech industry get to dominate our world so completely?

How did once-idealistic and innovative companies come to manipulate elections, violate our privacy, and pose a threat to the fabric of our democracy? In Don't Be Evil, Financial Times global business columnist Rana Foroohar documents how Big Tech lost its soul - and became the new Wall Street. Through her skilled reporting and unparalleled access - won through nearly 30 years covering business and technology - she shows the true extent to which the 'Faang's (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google) crush or absorb any potential competitors, hijack our personal data and mental space and offshore their exorbitant profits.

What's more, she reveals how these threats to our democracies, our livelihoods and our minds are all intertwined.

Yet Foroohar also lays out a plan for how we can resist, creating a framework that fosters innovation while also protecting us from the dark side of digital technology.