The Fair Trade Commission plans to embark on a large-scale investigation starting in January into murky practices and transactions involving information technology giants, it has been learned.
The investigation is expected to target such IT giants as Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon.com, which are collectively called GAFA, who now have a significant influence on the market.
For the investigation, the FTC is even considering invoking the compulsory powers of Article 40 of the Antimonopoly Law when needed.
The Liberal Democratic Party was to announce how the commission will proceeded with the investigation at a meeting Wednesday.
The FTC will mainly question the IT giants, firms that have business transactions with them, and consumer organizations, among others, in the investigation.
As the IT giants are said to have changed contracts unilaterally or set relatively expensive commission charges, client companies having deals with them have grown deeply dissatisfied with such situations.
The FTC plans to collect information mainly from such clients to find out what actually happens, as part of their efforts to get to the bottom of the problems.
Because some client firms are expected to refuse to provide information citing confidentiality agreements with the IT giants, the FTC plans to invoke Article 40 of the Antimonopoly Law, which will oblige them to disclose the terms and conditions of their business dealings.
In November, a government expert panel to study implementing regulations on IT giants proposed that a large-scale and thorough investigation should be carried out to achieve transparency of their business practices.
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