US urges Australia to abandon news payment plan for tech giants

The Office of the US Trade Representative called it a ‘burdensome’ plan that will ‘exclusively target’ Google and Facebook ‘without having first established a violation of existing Australian law or a market failure’. — AFP

SYDNEY: The United States has urged Australia to abandon its plan to force Google and Facebook to pay media outlets for their news content, saying there could be “long-lasting negative consequences” for consumers and companies.

Australia wants to force the US tech giants to pay local media organisations for hosting news content or face millions of dollars in fines, in one of the most aggressive moves globally to check their power.