"The largest corporations in the history of the world – Amazon, Facebook, Google, Apple, and Microsoft – are seeking to use ‘trade' rules to rig the rules of the global (digital) economy to enable them to collect more data, exercise more control over our lives and their workers, and amass ever more profit. More than 80 members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) are currently negotiating a new agreement on digital trade based on these proposals. This paper seeks to explain how these corporations operate in order to achieve their goals; what the potential impacts of the rules would be on workers, citizens, communities, developing countries, public services, safety and security, and democracy itself; what the alternatives are; and what we can do to stop this mass corporate takeover.
This paper was written towards the end of 2019. Today, in 2020, the world seems a different place, as we collectively experience the coronavirus crisis and new awareness about issues of racism and policy brutality. The crises have brought about new, and highlighted existing, urgent problems – often exacerbated by Big Tech's iron grip on our economic and social lives.
Emerging challenges in 2020
The WTO itself is in serious crisis. The 12th WTO Ministerial Conference was due to be held in June 2020, but has been postponed – possibly for another year. WTO Director-General Roberto Azevêdo has said he will step down on 31 August 2020, a year before the completion of his term of office. The United States is still blocking the appointment of new Appellate Body Members to the WTO, which means the judicial function is not operational."

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