The Apocalyptic Beast of Five Tech Heads

We may not know what big tech is, but we are surely using its resources in our everyday activities—even at this very moment, as you read this article. “Big tech is the term used to describe the four or five major technology companies, namely Facebook, Apple, Google, and Amazon. Microsoft is occasionally added to the list” (Joshi 2019).

The term big tech has become more common in public discourse since the 2016 and 2020 United States elections put it in the spotlight. However, this is not the first time big tech has come under social scrutiny. Years before, big tech was in the news due to companies’ data storage practices, which made “populations vulnerable by collecting data and allowing it to be accessed by governments” (Collins 2019).

These companies have been growing and expanding such that we now take them for granted in our lives, happily embracing them and enchanted by the free goodies they provide—free email, free data storage, free office software, free website hosting, free social presence, free photo sharing, free video sharing, great discounts for educational and non-profit organizations, and much more. This abundance of “gifts” has led us to ignore the big price of their “generosity.”

But just how big have these tech companies become? “The Big Five tech firms are among the biggest companies in the world, with a total market value of nearly €6tn (that’s six billion times a thousand). More than France, the United Kingdom and Italy’s combined tax income in a year. And despite the coronavirus pandemic (or rather because of it, actually) total profits of the Big Five are only going up—$50bn in the last quarter alone” (Tokmetzis and Bol 2020). This is a great economic power.

The Tech Giants, as we will call them, have power and they are not hiding it anymore; the Tech Giants have decided to flex their muscles right in front of our eyes. Only now are we waking up to notice how big and influential they have become. However, if we see it closer, we might realized that we are the ones who have given them that power.

What Is “Deplatforming”?

One of the powers the Tech Giants have been flexing recently is called “deplatforming.” This means removing someone’s access to the channels they use to reach their audience. “Deplatforming may involve not just banning the user or discontinuing service but also removing any existing content the user previously created on the site or service” (Wigmore 2018).

The Tech Giants are incredibly dominant in the technological market: most of what we do, online or not, is stored and processed by one of the big tech companies. Big tech is always there yet largely invisible to our everyday transactions. But today we see the Tech Giants having gained the power to shape the way our society operates and how it should progress (Joshi 2019).

Big tech has become so big that we don’t even notice we’re constantly standing on them. Any organization using cloud services has, in one way or another, practically surrendered their data, processes, and users to big tech. And this feels natural because the Tech Giants are almost everywhere and everybody is happy being served by them. All is good until you get deplatformed.

Can We Have a Life without the Tech Giants?

Tech reporter Kashmir Hill conducted an interesting experiment. In a self-deplatforming journey, she blocked five Tech Giants from her everyday life. She quit a different Tech Giant each week, and in the sixth week quit all of them together. The five Tech Giants she selected were Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Apple.

As part of this process, she documented her experience in a series of six videos for the tech website Gizmodo:

What was the end result of this experiment? Well, the title of the article she wrote for The New York Times tells it all: “I Tried to Live Without the Tech Giants. It Was Impossible” (Hill 2020). Or what she wrote for Gizmodo: “I Cut the ‘Big Five’ Tech Giants From My Life. It Was Hell” (Hill 2019).

In just a six-week experiment, Hill was practically isolated from how society operates—illustrating how the great majority live a life supported by big tech companies that have become inconspicuous yet so vital to our existence in many ways. As Hill found in her research, “these companies are unavoidable because they control internet infrastructure, online commerce, and information flows. Many of them specialize in tracking you around the web, whether you use their products or not. These companies started out selling books, offering search results, or showcasing college hotties, but they have expanded enormously and now touch almost every online interaction” (Hill 2019).

At the end of this self-inflicted experiment, however, Hill said, “I went back to using the companies’ services again, because as it demonstrated, I didn’t really have any other choice”(Hill 2020).

It is concerning to see the realization that there is no other choice but to go back to the de facto reality. Now Hill is back living the same tech life she had before. However, she has learned just how dependent we are on the Tech Giants; her eyes are open now. From now on, in every online transaction, she can surely see “what is going on.”

What if the Tech Giants Don’t Want You?

It was Hill’s personal decision to try to live without the Tech Giants, and it was her decision to return to them in a search for normality, too. But what if the tech giants decide they don’t want you or your organization to use their services? What if what they ask for violates your and/or your organization’s principles and there is no way back to “normal”?

Let’s focus this conversation on organizations: Are our organizations ready to operate without the Tech Giants? How much of your current operations depends on the Tech Giants? Do we have the local storage and/or software to manage the data we may be able to recover from the Tech Giants before being completely cut off? And after this event, would we be able to operate normally, or close to normally?

This kind of scenario does not need to be imagined because there are real cases we can analyze:

In a quick series of events in January 2020, the social media platform Parler was deplatformed from Amazon, Apple, and Google—completely deplatformed from the internet, with no way to fight back (Fitzpatrick 2021). Regardless of the different ways in which this event has been portrait by the news, Parler is an example of how fragile our access to cloud services is—even if we have been faithfully paying for them.

Somebody may be thinking, Well, if you don’t follow the rules this is what you deserve. And this is fair to say. However, what happens when the rules change? Are our organizations ready for a time when the “rules” are changed to be against our organization’s principles and beliefs?

Gab is another real-life scenario. According to its website, this social network service “champions free speech, individual liberty and the free flow of information online” (Gab n.d.). Depending on one’s view of free speech, Gab may be considered controversial. This service was deplatformed by Godaddy and lost control of its domain name. It was also deplatformed by Apple, Google, PayPal, Visa, and many banks (Duffield 2021). Gab is still alive and growing because it found a way to rebuild not dependent on the Tech Giants, but this has not stopped the constant campaigns to deplatform it.

Parler’s and Gab’s existence is controversial. However, both of them were struck by the Tech Giants’ silencing tool: deplatforming. And all based on a term that, until now, has not had a clear definition but has often been used to deplatform others as well: “hate speech.”

Are We Ready for the Time When Our Beliefs Will Become “Hate Speech”?

As Christians, we know this time is coming; in some places it has already arrived. This was the case in 2002, when lawmakers in Sweden gave initial approval to a law that could have a chilling effect on preaching against active homosexuality, deeming it hate speech (Dixon 2002).

It is not a new development that there are members in societies or communities who have strong negative reactions to religious groups and their beliefs, feel their interest or status in society is affected. But these groups now have a powerful tool to use against their opposition: to label them as “hate speech” (Moon 2019). Once the Tech Giants support them, deplatforming is coming.

Are our organizations ready to be deplatformed by the Tech Giants when our Christian beliefs are defined as hate speech? Or, more directly, are we ready for when Revelation 13:16–17 becomes reality? “It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name” (NIV).

We don’t know how or when this will happen. We don’t know how long it will take to be implemented. But we should be convinced that it will happen. Indeed, the question is: how are we preparing for the big deplatforming?

Considering what we know about our future it should be a call to our attention that some other businesses are maybe ahead of us analyzing “deplatforming” very closely: “The recent deplatforming of social media platform Parler is motivating businesses to better understand the risks of relying on technology service providers to keep them operating” (Starita 2021).

How Will We Operate after Being Deplatformed?

Parler did not have a plan in the event of deplatforming. Gab, on the other hand, had more foresight and their plan seems to be working (Duffield 2021); while Gab may not be available in the common app stores, it has been operating as a website app. In some ways, Gab has demonstrated that survival after deplatforming is possible. But what about our organizations? Are we working toward deplatform resilience?

What will we do when Google or Microsoft stops offering email services for our organizations? Are we ready to host and store our own email data?

What we will do when Microsoft or Amazon does not want our organization using their storage services, or virtualization and networking tools?

What office tools will our users use when Microsoft 365 cancels their license? There are alternatives out there; do our users know how to use them?

Something important to consider is the chain reaction created by being deplatformed by the Tech Giants. If Amazon or Microsoft deplatforms our institutions, it will trigger the rejection of cloud services from other companies who rely on the Tech Giants to run their business. Our organizations will not be allowed to indirectly use the Tech Giants for long. Other companies will not fight for us or risk their own relationship with the Tech Giants, which would affect their other clients who don’t have “hate speech” issues.

This analysis should be taken into consideration when looking to engage with a company providing internet or cloud services. We often engage cloud-based companies offering very attractive products. They promise to take good care of our data, affirm that we own our data (even if we can’t easy access it directly), and claim that in the event of moving apart we will be able to take our data back with no issue at all. It sounds very enchanting, right?

It is similar to hiring a catering company to cook our meals. They promise to take good care of the produce we give them, assure us that we will always own the produce, and we can take the produce back at any time if the relationship breaks. So we enter into business with them and enjoy their services. But suddenly we get deplatformed by a Tech Giant who serves our catering company. Sooner or later that catering company will contact us to say they can’t do business with us anymore. They’ll drop off a big package of produce we “own” and say goodbye. And it is at this moment that we will realize we don’t have a kitchen anymore, nor anyone who knows how to cook the meals. So what value is there in having the produce back?

What will we do when the Tech Giants deplatform our organizations and big packages of plain data from all the cloud companies we use are dropped at our organizations’ “doorsteps”?

Is It Too Late to Escape the Tech Giants?

According to Kashmir Hill, escaping from the “Tech Giants” is impossible.

Critics of the big tech companies are often told, “If you don’t like the company, don’t use its products.” My takeaway from the experiment was that it’s not possible to do that. It’s not just the products and services branded with the big tech giant’s name. It’s that these companies control a thicket of more obscure products and services that are hard to untangle from tools we rely on for everything we do, from work to getting from point A to point B. (Hill 2020)

The apocalyptic beast of five tech heads has shown itself. It has shaken companies and made governments concerned. And we know we are on its target list because of what we believe and preach. As Christian organizations, we know we won’t get the chance to “return to big tech.” And this should be a strong call to re-analyze our reality and start to get ready for the great deplatforming.

I don’t think it’s too late to escape, but I recognize that it won’t be an easy process—not because it is a difficult and challenging thing to do, but because of the multiple paradigms and practices the Tech Giants have created in the tech community and our users. By nature people have difficulty embracing change, and especially when that change means being different from the rest.

What can we do? I can summarize my advice with four points informed by my expertise in the area of systems development:

First, stop surrendering our data and processes to online service providers who limit access to our data. We should focus on systems that allow us to always have direct access to our data or database. We should know how our data is structured and learn how to operate it without the external service.

Second, identify the current cloud services hosting our data and build a plan for how to re-assimilate them under our local storage and responsibility. Regular “deplatform drills” should be executed to test if our organizations are ready for such an event.

Third, build Tech-Giant-free software that can be shared between our organizations. Dependence on the Tech Giants has driven development in our organizations to near-extinction levels. We should start assembling a team of Tech-Giant-free developers ready to build the systems our organizations need with the help of open-source tools that are not owned by a Tech Giant. With a proper team, we can build software at a level competitive to any other company.

Fourth, work on the complex task of creating “deplatform awareness” amongst our leaders, coworkers, and users. This is necessary to create strategies, budgets, and policies to tackle this challenging endeavor.

Let’s Not Forget Our Mission

As Christians we have a mission to preach the gospel and we need the tools to do that until the very last minute. We should plan and strategize a way to make sure we have the tools to do our mission considering the imminent big tech deplatforming.

Let us not forget the times in which we are living and the afflictions of our time. “You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see” (Rev 3:17–18 NIV).

While we move toward our mission, we should not let our investment in the Tech Giants be a reason to look back nostalgically and eventually become a salt statue.

References

Collins, Katie. 2019. “Edward Snowden Says Facebook, Amazon and Google Engage in ‘Abuse.’” CNet. November 4, 2019. https://www.cnet.com/news/edward-snowden-says-facebook-amazon-and-google-engage-in-abuse/.

Dixon, Tomas. 2002. “‘Hate Speech’ Law Could Chill Sermons.” Christianity Today. August 5, 2002. https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2002/august5/15.22.html.

Duffield, Will. 2021. “A Brief History of ‘Deep Deplatforming.’” Cato Institute. January 22, 2021. https://www.cato.org/blog/brief-history-deep-deplatforming.

Fitzpatrick, Alex. 2021. “Why Amazon’s Move to Drop Parler Is a Big Deal for the Future of the Internet.” Time. January 21, 2021. https://time.com/5929888/amazon-parler-aws/.

Gab. n.d. “About Gab.com” n.d. Accessed April 5, 2021. https://gab.com/about.

Joshi, Naveen. 2019. “What Is Big Tech and Why We Should Care.” Allerin. August 21, 2019. https://www.allerin.com/blog/what-is-big-tech-and-why-we-should-care.

Hill, Kashmir. 2019. “I Cut the ‘Big Five’ Tech Giants From My Life. It Was Hell.” Gizmodo. February 7, 2019. https://gizmodo.com/i-cut-the-big-five-tech-giants-from-my-life-it-was-hel-1831304194.

Hill, Kashmir. 2020. “I Tried to Live Without the Tech Giants. It Was Impossible.” The New York Times. July 31, 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/31/technology/blocking-the-tech-giants.html.

Moon, Richard. 2019. “Religion and Hate Speech.” The Immanent Frame. January 18, 2019. https://tif.ssrc.org/2019/01/18/religion-and-hate-speech/.

Starita, Laura. 2021. “Can Your Cloud Provider Deplatform You?.” Smarter With Gartner. February 15, 2021. https://www.gartner.com/smarterwithgartner/can-your-cloud-provider-deplatform-you/.

Tokmetzis, Dimitri and Riffy Bol. 2020. “Big Tech Has Immense Power. Here’s How Europe and the United States Are Trying to Rein Them In.” The Correspondent. November 27, 2020. https://thecorrespondent.com/802/big-tech-has-immense-power-heres-how-europe-and-the-united-states-are-trying-to-rein-them-in/106065141600-e6755f39.

Wigmore, Ivy. 2018. “Deplatform.” WhatIs. https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/deplatform.