Silicon Valley is the name given to a region located in California,
United States, where the headquarters of the largest and most powerfulhigh-tech companies, such as Meta and Amazon, are located. In recent
decades, so-called Big Tech has become one of the strongest forces in
the global bourgeoisie, dominating fields such as communications,
entertainment, real estate, transportation, military development,
finance, and commerce. In Forbes' list of the ten richest people in the
world for 2024, seven are from the technology sector, with four leading
the list: Elon Musk (Tesla, SpaceX, X) - who could soon become the
world's first trillionaire -, Larry Elisson (Oracle), Jeff Bezos
(Amazon), and Mark Zuckerberg (Meta). In seventh and eighth place are
Larry Page and Sergey Brin (Alphabet Inc., owner of Google), and
finally, in tenth place, is Steve Ballmer (Microsoft).
Giant technology companies dominate the global flow of information and
interactions and consolidate unprecedented power over the political,
economic, and intellectual-moral structures of society, thus
contributing to the dominance of the statist-capitalist system. This
technological control is fundamental to the advancement of neoliberalism
worldwide, serving to dismantle state regulations, weaken social rights,
expand the reach of far-right ideology (xenophobia, misogyny,
LGBTphobia, racism, etc.), and deepen social fragmentation, weakening
the class struggle.
Big Tech and Imperialism
The largest technology conglomerates are largely concentrated in the
United States. Notable names include Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, Netflix,
Airbnb, Uber, and OpenAI.
One of the most powerful is certainly Alphabet, which includes brands
like Google, with its email service (Gmail), mapping services (Google
Maps, Google Earth, Waze), cloud storage services (Cloud Drive),
browsers (Chrome), video streaming services (YouTube), operating systems
(Android), and much more. Other companies controlled by Alphabet include
Chita and Verily, in the biotechnology and healthcare sectors, and
CapitalG and GV, in the venture capital sector. Alphabet's power is so
pervasive that it was the target of a monopoly lawsuit filed by the U.S.
State Department, potentially forcing it to break up and sell some of
its brands.
Another prominent Silicon Valley giant is Meta, which has become a
benchmark in the social media field, owning Facebook (3 billion users
worldwide), Instagram (2 billion), WhatsApp (2 billion), and Threads
(300 million). In 2020, it was the Big Tech company that invested the
most in lobbying to influence the U.S. Congress, spending approximately
$19.7 million.
In 2013, Edward Snowden's revelations about PRISM, a U.S. National
Security Agency (NSA) operation launched in 2007 following the passage
of the Protect America Act under the Bush administration, became public.
This operation initiated a mass surveillance scheme of the global
population through the monitoring of phone calls, credit card
transactions, and internet activity (searches, emails, etc.), including
social media. Several files indicated active collaboration with the U.S.
government by Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, and Meta. The documents also
indicated that then-President Dilma Rousseff and Petrobras were under
surveillance.
In 2017, the United States launched Project Maven, focused on processing
military data, initially in collaboration with Google. Later, the main
partners became Palantir Technologies, Amazon Web Services, ECS Federal,
L3Harris Technologies, Maxar Technologies, Microsoft, and Sierra Nevada.
This is an artificial intelligence (AI) system geared toward military
operations, greatly enhancing strike capabilities-with the help of
algorithms, it can strike hundreds to thousands of targets per hour
without the need for large numbers of human personnel on the ground. In
other words, the extermination of individuals and groups that the US may
consider enemies, threats, and/or terrorists. A system similar to the
use of AI in military operations is being used by Israel and Ukraine.
In 2022, Google was accused of secretly developing Project Vivian, which
aimed to combat unionization efforts among the company's employees. A
2019 lawsuit filed by current and former employees exposed the company's
anti-union practices and the company's hiring of IRI Consultants, a
consulting firm designed to combat unionization efforts. This wasn't an
isolated incident; other Big Tech companies like Facebook, Microsoft,
Amazon, Apple, and Uber also conspired to sabotage their employees'
unionization efforts or, in the case of Uber, create justifications for
dismissal or lockouts.
Several Big Tech companies have collaborated with the State of Israel in
its apartheid policies against the Palestinian people, such as Alphabet
and Amazon, which were selected to provide Israeli government agencies
with cloud computing services, including artificial intelligence and
machine learning. Another company, Airbnb, is accused of allowing the
rental of properties in Zionist settlements in the occupied Palestinian
territories.
The Elon Musk Case
The world's richest man, Elon Musk, owns a number of technology
companies, including Tesla, which has become a benchmark in clean
energy, including electric cars and solar panels, and SpaceX, the
largest in space exploration. The billionaire is also involved with
companies such as X (social network), the Boring Company (tunneling),
Neuralink (neurotechnology), and xAI (artificial intelligence).
Contrary to his pro-free-market rhetoric, according to The Times , Elon
Musk has benefited from approximately $4.9 billion in U.S. government
support, including subsidies, tax breaks, factory construction,
discounted loans, and environmental credits. Through his space company,
SpaceX, he also has several collaboration agreements with NASA and the
U.S. military.
However, despite his explicit commitment to US interests, Musk is also
an enthusiastic negotiator with China and Russia. Tesla's main factories
are located in China, which has led Musk to call for the lifting of US
sanctions against the regime, as well as to heap praise on the Communist
Party leadership. In the context of the Ukraine War, despite initially
making Starlink services available to Ukrainians and NATO, he later
advocated for mediation with Russia, signaling a rapprochement with
Vladimir Putin.
Musk's interests have shifted to Latin America over the past decade,
particularly regarding lithium reserves in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, and
Bolivia. In 2019, a military coup in Bolivia ousted leftist president
Evo Morales, with the support of Trump and Bolsonaro. After being
accused on Twitter (now X) of involvement, Elon Musk responded: "We'll
coup whoever we want! Deal with it." In Brazil, in January 2022, the
National Telecommunications Agency approved the use of SpaceX's Starlink
satellites, which quickly began to be used in illegal mining.
Like most Big Tech owners, Musk long aligned himself with the Democratic
Party while it was in power. In recent years, however, he has shifted
more toward the far right, aligning himself with Donald Trump, Javier
Milei, Giorgia Meloni, Viktor Orbán, and other conservative and
neo-fascist figures. In the name of supposedly defending "freedom of
expression," the billionaire began openly challenging social-liberal and
social-democratic governments, including those in countries allied with
US imperialism, such as Australia, Canada, and France. In 2024, Musk
openly supported far-right parties opposed to the European Union, such
as the AfD (in Germany) and Reform UK (in the United Kingdom). Despite
this rhetoric, Elon Musk removed profiles on Facebook of opponents of
right-wing authoritarian governments, such as Erdogan's in Turkey and
Modi's in India. On November 17, 2023, he also announced that users who
denounced Israeli colonialism in Palestine would be banned, a practice
that reveals the extent to which social networks controlled by Big Tech
operate algorithms in order to shape the political, cultural, and social
narrative, on a global scale, according to the most reactionary
ideological interests - an aggravation caused by neoliberalism, which is
opening space for the resurgence of neo-fascism and neo-Nazism.
Beyond Silicon Valley
Despite the economic power of US companies, they are not the only ones
with relevance and impact on the global stage. Aligned with US policies
are Samsung, from South Korea, and TSMC (the world's largest chipmaker),
from Taiwan.
China has become one of the biggest competitors for US interests. Its
companies include Lenovo (smartphones), Huawei (telecommunications),
Alibaba (digital commerce), Baidu (internet, artificial intelligence),
Shein (e-commerce), and Xiaomi (electronics). One of the largest Chinese
conglomerates is Tencent, owner of the WeChat app, a WhatsApp competitor
with approximately 1.3 billion users. It also operates in the film,
music, data processing, healthcare, and e-commerce industries, and has
become a major shareholder in several foreign companies, such as Ubisoft
(games) and Discord (communications).
In the social media arena, China relies on ByteDance and Kuaishou,
owners of TikTok (1.6 billion users) and Kwai (1 billion), respectively.
TikTok and Kwai have been accused of enabling the proliferation of
far-right propaganda in several countries, including France and
Argentina. While Donald Trump, throughout 2024, began defending TikTok's
operation in the United States, in Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro's
government approved its ban for allowing coup-supporting content.
With a smaller presence than Chinese companies, it's worth mentioning
the case of Telegram, owned by Russian-born Frenchman Pavel Durov. With
around 900 million users worldwide, the app has been accused of
indiscriminately allowing dangerous content, such as child pornography,
advocacy of neo-Nazism, arms trafficking, and jihadist movements. For
many years, Durov was at odds with the Putin government, but throughout
2024, Telegram was accused of favoring pro-Russian propaganda in the war
in Ukraine.
Big Tech and Brazil
In digital commerce, marketplace companies have a large presence. In
2024, the most visited companies were, respectively, Mercado Livre
(Argentina/Uruguay), Amazon (USA), Shopee (Singapore), Magazine Luiza
(Brazil), OLX (Netherlands), Shein (China), AliExpress (China), Ifood
(Brazil), Casas Bahia (Brazil), and Samsung (South Korea).
Meta is the dominant social media platform, with a significant portion
of the population using WhatsApp (150 million users), Instagram (135
million, the third-largest country in terms of number of accounts on the
platform), Facebook (110 million, the fourth-largest in terms of number
of accounts), and Facebook Messenger (60 million). Alphabet/Google's
YouTube has 145 million users. Next are TikTok (100 million), LinkedIn
(75 million), Kwai (60 million), Pinterest (40 million), Twitter/X (22
million), and Snapchat (7 million).
A report published by Repórter Brasil in 2022 exposed that Apple,
Google, Microsoft, and Amazon used illegal gold from Brazilian
Indigenous lands in their devices. According to the report, the four
companies acquired illegal gold mined on Indigenous lands in the Amazon
through the Italian company Chimet and Brazilian company Marsan. During
Bolsonaro's administration, the region saw a surge in organized crime
targeting mining, leading to deforestation, environmental crimes
aggravated by mercury poisoning, and murders against several Indigenous
ethnic groups-primarily the Kayapó and Yanomami.
In 2023, Big Tech companies took strong action to defeat Bill No. 2630,
better known as the Fake News Bill, in Congress. The bill's intention
was to regulate and hold social media accountable for the content users
post on their platforms, resulting in an increase in misinformation,
conspiracy theories, anti-science (especially anti-vaccine), xenophobic,
misogynistic, racist, and, more broadly, radical far-right
rhetoric-neo-fascist and neo-Nazi. In a virtual campaign orchestrated by
large companies, posts criticizing the bill as an "attack on freedom of
expression," "anti-democratic," etc., were promoted. A report by Agência
Pública showed that Google paid Meta over R$670,000 in ads against the
bill in less than two months, aiming to wage a narrative war and spread
disinformation throughout society.
The role of digital capitalism in global manipulation
In the contemporary capitalist model, informational manipulation is an
essential tool for preserving the dominance of a privileged minority
over the majority of the population. In December 2024, Google allegedly
misrepresented the dollar exchange rate on its platform, creating a
scenario of economic speculation that benefited big capital investors.
Similarly, it interfered politically in Brazil, concealing information
about center-left candidates and favoring the far-right.
Actions like these demonstrate that Big Tech exerts direct economic and
political influence, acting as instruments for deepening class
inequalities and the power of global ruling classes.
The current stage of statist capitalism, based on policies of maximizing
austerity and deregulation, is the stage that accentuates a greater
concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a few. To ensure its
reproduction, it uses a sophisticated ideological apparatus, in which
disinformation and algorithmic manipulation play a central role. This
ideological apparatus will establish itself not only on social media but
also through the development of programs and platforms that can be used
in public school systems, through courses and/or teaching and learning
materials.
Antisocialist rhetoric, which accuses critical voices of "threatening
the social order," is a classic strategy of the ruling classes to weaken
movements seeking social justice and wealth redistribution. However, the
real chaos is caused by the dismantling of public policies and labor
rights, promoted by these corporations to sustain the concentration of
power and wealth.
The role of Big Tech in the advancement of neofascism
Capitalist crises, such as the one in 2008, have intensified the
exploitation of the working masses and worsened their living conditions.
Unable to offer concrete alternatives, capital uses the far right as a
scapegoat to channel popular discontent. Neofascist movements, such as
the Alternative for Germany (AfD), are examples of how capital promotes
divisionism to weaken collective struggles.
In this context, Big Tech not only replicates the strategies of
totalitarianism, such as the manipulation of truth and informational
isolation in bubbles, but also creates mechanisms of social control
through algorithmic engineering.
The appointment of figures like UFC figurehead Dana White to Meta's
board is emblematic. White, with his authoritarian and deregulatory
rhetoric, illustrates how these corporations reinforce discourses that
delegitimize popular sovereignty and strengthen corporate elites.
Another example is Meta's decision to abolish fact-checking, replacing
it with a "community rating" system. Despite presenting itself as a
"freedom of expression" initiative, this change legitimizes the spread
of misinformation, favoring far-right and ultra-reactionary discourse.
Shortly after taking office for his second term, Donald Trump announced
a $500 billion investment in an Artificial Intelligence (AI)
infrastructure project, with Oracle, Softbank, and OpenAI as the main
beneficiaries.
Towards a self-managed socialist alternative
The logic of ultraliberalism promotes alienation and impedes the
development of class consciousness, which is necessary to transform
social structures. To overcome this reality, workers must unite on a
global scale, opposing the concentrated power of digital corporations.
The organized working class must act as a mediator for popular
sovereignty, pushing for the regulation of Big Tech's power, taxing
their operations, and redistributing the fruits of technologically
generated wealth. Furthermore, the creation of public and cooperative
platforms focused on the common good must be prioritized, placing
technology at the service of the social majority.
The emancipation of the masses will only be possible through collective
struggle against capitalist exploitation. Recovering the centrality of
labor over capital and strengthening truly democratic mechanisms are
fundamental steps to ensuring that the digital age is not just another
stage in the oppression of the working classes, but an opportunity to
build a caring and socialist society.
Libertarian Socialist Organization
August 2025
https://socialismolibertario.net/2025/08/25/big-techs-controle-informacional-e-capitalismo/
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