The U.S. government needs to bury the hatchet with Big Tech and harvest the innovation of firms like Google, Apple, and Facebook so that the West can better compete with Beijing’s rapid technological advancements, according to a visiting Australian senator.
Senator James Paterson, of the centre-right Liberal Party and now-shadow minister for foreign interference, said the great power struggle in the 21st Century would be marked by “technological battlegrounds” such as artificial intelligence (AI), semiconductors, 5G, quantum computing, and green tech.
He said that while politicians will “never go out of business beating up on Big Tech,” legislators should look toward the “bigger strategic picture.”…