GLOBAL
Oxfam: The Most Hopeful Economic Story That’s Not in the News – Rebecca Riddell
This month, something historic occurred—not that you’d know by paying attention to the headlines. Countries began negotiating the text of a new tax convention—one that has the potential to drastically improve global tax rules and help countries raise the money needed to provide the basics, like quality public education and healthcare, for billions of people.
Whether you want to fight oligarchy, end global poverty, or tackle the climate crisis, the road to doing so runs through tax. That’s why delegates representing countries around the world crowded into a negotiating room at the UN to start talks on a binding tax treaty, joined by experts and trade unions, as well as tax justice, faith-based, human rights, anti-poverty groups and more.
Noticeably absent was the world’s largest economy. The United States dramatically walked out of preparatory negotiations in February, shortly after President Trump took office. The good news is the world is moving on – and forward, with an ambitious effort that could help deliver meaningful solutions to some of the most urgent crises of our times. It’s the US that could be left behind.
DRN: New report from the DRN: A response to the funding crisis from a Global Majority perspective
The Global Network for Social Justice and Digital Resilience (DRN) is pleased to share a new report titled Pulse 2025, The Trump Effect on Digital Resilience in the Global Majority. This brief explores the most recent changes in the ecosystem and analyzes the evolution of the geopolitical, technological, and activism trends presented previously in the Scanning the Horizon (2024) report, from a Global Majority perspective.
Following the first six months of the Trump administration, the DRN report zooms in on these topics to highlight the main challenges the digital resilience ecosystem will need to address over the next decade, as well as to identify possible interventions and opportunities for action.
ASIA
TheStar: Fahmi says under-16s will be barred from social media next year – Martin Carvalho
Malaysians under 16 will not be allowed to sign up for social media accounts from next year, says Datuk Fahmi Fadzil.
The Communications Minister reiterated the Madani government’s plan to improve children’s online safety.
He said platform providers are expected to implement electronic know your customer identity verification next year.
“We expect all platform providers to be ready to implement eKYC by next year,” he said on Sunday (Nov 23).
NBC: Australian teenagers ask high court to block social media ban
A constitutional challenge against Australia’s social media ban on children younger than 16 has been filed in the nation’s highest court, two weeks before the world-first law is set to take effect.
A campaign group called the Digital Freedom Project said Wednesday that it had launched proceedings in the High Court of Australia in a bid to block the law, with two 15-year-olds, Noah Jones and Macy Neyland, as plaintiffs in the case.
ITIF: The Korean Government Should Keep Its Word and Push Against the Misleading “Fairness Act” – Rodrigo Balbontin and Sejin Kim
South Korea appears to have caved to US demands regarding its digital competition laws. Big Tech and its lobbyists are of course delighted at this outcome, and are pushing for more as this piece by the ITIF indicates.
“The United States and South Korea released a joint fact sheet last week outlining their trade relations. The agreement moves in the right direction regarding digital issues, as it eliminates non-tariff barriers such as network usage fees and online platform regulations, as well as facilitates cross-border data transfers, including location data, reinsurance data, and personal data. Now, the Korean government must turn these announcements into reality. The first step should be explicitly stopping all efforts to push the misleadingly named “Fairness Act.”…Korea’s over-regulation and interventionist approach in the digital economy is clearly a concern for U.S. trade negotiators. It is important to understand American priorities to rebalance trade and economic relations. U.S. policymakers have been increasingly concerned about Non-Tariff Attacks—how discriminatory regulations and taxes with arbitrary thresholds are targeting American companies all over the world.”
Medianama: Explainer: What the DPDP Rules Mean for Cross-Border Data Flows and MLAT-Based Data Sharing – Azdhan
India has finalised and notified the DPDP Rules, which will operationalise the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023. While the Act and its rules enable the central government to control cross-border personal data transfers, including blocking transfers to specific countries, they also raise questions about how these powers will interact with existing agreements, such as the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT), and laws like the US’s RISA Act.
For context, Section 16(1) allows the government to restrict data transfers to certain countries, Rule 15 requires data fiduciaries to follow government-imposed conditions before sending data abroad, and Section 17(2)(a) exempts certain state agencies from most compliance obligations when they process data for “national security” or for “maintaining friendly relations with foreign states.”
Medianama: Gig Workers Now Legally Recognised Under India’s Labour Codes, But Key Details Still Missing – Aakriti Bansal
The Indian Government brought four Labour Codes into effect on November 21, 2025, which replace 29 separate laws and create four consolidated frameworks governing wages, social security, industrial relations and workplace safety across India.
For the platform-based economy, this is the first time gig and platform workers are formally recognised in labour legislation after years of operating without a clear legal category.
Importantly, the notification covers key categories such as gig and platform workers, Information Technology (IT) workers, Information Technology Enabled Services (ITES) workers, audio-visual workers and digital-media workers, among others.
It changes how these sectors issue contracts, release salaries, maintain records and meet compliance obligations.
Medianama: What Does Gig Work Really Mean When Platforms Can Remove Workers Without Notice? – Aakriti Bansal
The Telangana High Court (HC) has issued notices to the State government, the Labour Commissioner, and Zomato India Pvt. Ltd. in a writ petition filed by delivery worker Mohd. Khaleel Ahmed, who says Zomato blocked his worker ID without notice or explanation. The petition came up before Justice Nagesh Bheemapaka who, after hearing arguments from Advocate Syed Mounis Abidi, sought responses from all parties
Khaleel, a 35-year-old delivery worker earning about Rs. 15,000 per month, said his ID was suddenly deactivated on November 7, 2024. He claimed that Zomato cited a vague “behavioural issue” but offered no evidence, no notice, and no opportunity to respond. This happened despite his maintaining a rating of 4.85 on the platform. The sudden cutoff pushed his family into rent arrears and left him without income.
EUROPE
Politico: US demands digital concessions in return for EU steel tariff relief – Antonia Zimmermann, Pieter Haeck, Koen Verhelst and Camille Gijs
The EU’s push for the U.S. to scrap its tariffs on steel and aluminum has opened the door to an old demand from Washington: Loosen your digital rule book, and we’ll meet you halfway.
Brussels raised its concerns over Washington’s expanded list of goods covered by high steel and aluminum tariffs at meetings on Monday between Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič and EU trade ministers and, from the U.S. side, Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick and Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.
After the Europeans raised the steel tariffs on Monday, Lutnick responded by calling on the EU to “analyze their digital rules, trying to come away with a balance … not put them away, but find a balanced approach that works with us.”
Bloomberg: EU Rejects US Demand to Ease Tech Rules for Lower Steel Tariffs – Samuel Stolton and Jorge Valero
The European Union’s antitrust chief ruled out easing the bloc’s tech rulebook, after US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Brussels needed to change its digital regulations in order to get a deal to lower steel and aluminum tariffs.
“The European digital rulebook is not up for negotiation,” Teresa Ribera, a vice president at the European Commission, said in a statement late Monday. “We, Europeans, have adopted our rules to ensure fair markets and to protect consumers rights while securing Europe’s digital future.”
Politico: Top EU official accuses US of ‘blackmail’ in trade talks – Francesca Micheletti and Jacob Parry
Europe’s antitrust chief Teresa Ribera has unleashed a blistering attack on the Trump administration, accusing Washington of using “blackmail” to strong-arm the EU into watering down its tech rulebook.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on Monday in Brussels that the U.S. could modify its approach on steel and aluminum tariffs if the EU reconsidered its digital rules. European officials interpreted his remarks as targeting the EU’s flagship tech regulations, including the Digital Markets Act (DMA).
“It is blackmail,” the Spanish commissioner told POLITICO in an interview on Wednesday. “[This] being their intention does not mean that we accept that kind of blackmail.”
PeopleV.BigTech: Ursula! Fight for Europe, not for them!
Since returning to office, Donald Trump and his Big Tech cronies have launched a full-scale pressure campaign against the EU’s digital laws.
Right now, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and the Commission are deciding whether to break up Google’s illegal adtech monopoly or cave to escalating pressure from Donald Trump and Big Tech CEOs.
This moment isn’t just about the future of one tech giant. It’s about who rules Europe:
Europeans – or Silicon Valley billionaires and the White House?
People vs Big Tech, WeMove Europe, Avaaz, and European Digital Rights (EDRi) are calling on President von der Leyen to enforce EU law and break up Google – before Europe becomes a colony of Big Tech and Trumpism.
EDRI: Press Release: Commission’s Digital Omnibus is a major rollback of EU digital protections
Today the European Commission has published two Digital Omnibus proposals, reopening the EU’s core protections against harm in the digital age. This step risks dismantling the rules-based system that was hard-won over decades, endangering the very foundation of human rights and tech policy in the EU.
TACD: Streamlining or deregulation? TACD sounds alarm on EU Digital Omnibus
The Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue (TACD), a coalition of 70+ leading consumer and digital rights groups from the United States and Europe, is deeply concerned about the European Commission’s upcoming “Digital Omnibus Package.” What is billed as a technical effort to “simplify” digital rules risks dismantling the very protections that make Europe’s digital framework a global model, with repercussions at a global scale.
Should the Commission consider such changes, this would weaken key laws like the GDPR, AI Act, DMA and DSA, it will endanger consumers’ privacy, data security, and safety while giving Big Tech even greater dominance.
EDRI: Forthcoming Digital Omnibus would mark point of no return
For months, EDRi has warned of the serious threats that would be posed to people, planet and democracy by the proposed reopening of the EU’s digital rules. This is not happening in isolation: EDRi is part of a huge group of organisations warning against this broad dismantling of social, rights and environmental protections by the European Commission and other lawmakers.
Now, leaked documents reveal that – despite the Commission’s promises that the reform of the EU’s digital rulebook would not weaken core protections for people’s rights and freedoms – the reality is that this would be “the biggest rollback of digital fundamental rights in EU history”. Over a hundred civil society organisations, trade unions and defenders of the public interest have joined together to “urge the European Commission to immediately halt any attempts to reopen the GDPR, ePrivacy framework, AI Act or other core digital rights protections”.
NYT: Europe Begins Rethinking Its Crackdown on Big Tech – Adam Satariano and Jeanna Smialek
After more than a decade of aggressively regulating the technology industry, the European Union is having second thoughts.
In a significant shift, policymakers in Brussels are moving to scale back and simplify landmark rules for artificial intelligence and data privacy. Driven by growing concern that overregulation is stifling economic growth, officials and business leaders across the 27-nation bloc are questioning whether Europe’s digital rulebook has gone too far and left companies lagging the United States and China. The Trump administration has also criticized Europe’s regulations.
TheGuardian: EU could water down AI Act amid pressure from Trump and big tech – Jennifer Rankin
The European Commission is considering plans to delay parts of the EU’s Artificial Intelligence Act, after intense pressure from businesses and Donald Trump’s administration.
The commission confirmed that “a reflection” was “still ongoing” on delaying aspects of the regulation, after media reports that Brussels was weighing up changes with the aim of easing demands on big tech companies.
NOYB: Text of the internal draft amendments on the GDPR and ePrivacy in the “Digital Omnibus”
This document provides a clause by clause comparison of the proposals to “simplify” the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation, highlighting how the changes are likely to significantly affect the protection of privacy rights.
EC: EU launches Trade and Investment Dialogue with Trans-Pacific bloc
Today, in Australia, EU Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič launched, together with his twelve counterparts, the first EU-CPTPP Trade and Investment Dialogue.
They reaffirmed their joint commitment to open, rules-based trade, while delivering tangible results.
This is an important milestone, as the EU and the members of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) represent 32% of global GDP and 37% of global trade. The EU-CPTPP Trade and Investment Dialogue will cover result-oriented cooperation between the two blocs in five key areas: trade diversification, digital trade, trade and investment facilitation, supply chain resilience, and the global trade environment, including World Trade Organisation reform.
EUParliament: Children should be at least 16 to access social media, say MEPs
On Wednesday, MEPs adopted a non-legislative report by 483 votes in favour, 92 against and with 86 abstentions, expressing deep concern over the physical and mental health risks minors face online and calling for stronger protection against the manipulative strategies that can increase addiction and that are detrimental to children’s ability to concentrate and engage healthily with online content.
NORTH AMERICA
TheMailandGlobe: Canada’s digital sovereignty is crumbling under aggressive U.S. lobbying – Matt Malone
It is axiomatic of Canada’s recent sovereignty discourse that we talk fiercely about standing up to the United States before we fold. Rescinding the Digital Services Tax on Big Tech just to restart trade negotiations. Removing countertariffs on USMCA-compliant goods, even while the U.S. keeps tariffs of their own. Canada bluffs. The U.S. calls. We fold.
Now the soap opera is about to play out again. This time, it will involve the Online Streaming Act, which updates Canadian broadcasting laws to cover streaming. Effectively, the climbdown started Tuesday, when the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) released its regulatory policy defining the term “Canadian program” under the law. The regulator watered down the definition and talked about “increased collaboration between foreign streamers.”
WhiteHouse: Joint Fact Sheet on President Donald J. Trump’s Meeting
with President Lee Jae Myung
The White House released a fact sheet detailing negotiations between the US and South Korea. Amongst other commitments, the document states that “The United States and the ROK commit to ensure that U.S. companies are not discriminated against and do not face unnecessary barriers in terms of laws and policies concerning digital services, including network usage fees and online platform regulations, and to facilitate cross-border transfer of data, including for location, reinsurance, and personal data. Further, the United States and the ROK will support the permanent moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions at the World Trade Organization.”
Politico: Tariffs are on trial, but US trade talks are moving full steam ahead – Ari Hawkins, Daniel Desrochers and Phelim Kine
The White House is plowing ahead with negotiations on tariffs, despite the fact the Supreme Court may soon strike down a large chunk of them. And foreign trading partners are still playing ball.
According to more than half a dozen foreign diplomats and people close to the negotiations, some of whom were granted anonymity to discuss strategy, other governments continue to press for deals to avoid President Donald Trump’s tariffs on sectors like autos and steel and others (as well as threatened ones on pharmaceuticals and semiconductors), which are not affected by the court challenge. And they are betting the administration will be able to use other laws to reimpose at least some of the duties that could be struck down.
BBC: Judge rules Meta doesn’t have monopoly after Instagram, WhatsApp acquisitions – Lily Jamali
A US district judge in Washington has ruled that Facebook-parent Meta Platforms did not violate antitrust laws with its acquisitions of photo-sharing app Instagram and messaging service WhatsApp more than a decade ago.
The decision hands a defeat to the Federal Trade Commission, the US antitrust watchdog, which sued Meta in 2020 claiming the company secured a monopoly in social media by purchasing its rivals.
WaPo: White House drafts order directing Justice Department to sue states that pass AI regulations – Gerrit De Vynck and Nitasha Tiku
The Trump administration is drafting an executive order that would direct the Justice Department to sue states that pass laws regulating artificial intelligence, according to a copy reviewed by The Washington Post and confirmed by a person familiar with the White House effort, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions. But the proposal could conflict with legal limits to presidential power.
Reuters: Meta buried ‘causal’ evidence of social media harm, US court filings allege – Jeff Horwitz
Meta shut down internal research into the mental health effects of Facebook after finding causal evidence that its products harmed users’ mental health, according to unredacted filings in a lawsuit by U.S. school districts against Meta and other social media platforms.
In a 2020 research project code-named “Project Mercury,” Meta scientists worked with survey firm Nielsen to gauge the effect of “deactivating” Facebook, according to Meta documents obtained via discovery. To the company’s disappointment, “people who stopped using Facebook for a week reported lower feelings of depression, anxiety, loneliness and social comparison,” internal documents said.
Rather than publishing those findings or pursuing additional research, the filing states, Meta called off further work and internally declared that the negative study findings were tainted by the “existing media narrative” around the company.
Nature: Trump’s AI ‘Genesis Mission’: what are the risks and opportunities? – Elizabeth Gibney, Alexandra Witze and Jenna Ahart
The White House has launched a plan to accelerate research in the United States, by building artificial intelligence (AI) models on the rich scientific data sets held by the country’s 17 national laboratories, as well as harnessing their enormous computing resources.
An executive order issued on 24 November instructs the US Department of Energy (DoE) to create a platform through which academic researchers and AI firms can create powerful AI models using the government’s scientific data. Framed as part of a race for global technology dominance, it lists collaborations with technology firms including Microsoft, IBM, OpenAI, Google and Anthropic, as well as quantum-computing companies such as Quantinuum. Such a vast public–private partnership would give companies unprecedented access to federal scientific data sets for AI-driven analysis.
LATIN AMERICA
DW: How Latin America tries to cope with Trump’s tariffs – Claudia Laszczak | Maria Padilla Canete
Trade between the US and Latin America tops more than a trillion dollars, but tariffs and shifting supply chains are causing uncertainty. How are Mexico, Brazil and others navigating this changing landscape?
The US maintains strong trade ties with Latin America, with goods exchange surpassing $1 trillion (€867 billion) in 2023, largely driven by Mexico. Last year, trade between the US and Mexico reached a whopping $840 billion, followed by Brazil at $92 billion. Despite the Trump administration’s tariffs, the US continues to import vehicles, industrial supplies and food from the region, while exporting similar goods.
Still, higher tariffs have sparked uncertainty across Latin America. Experts warn that US protectionist measures could boost China’s trade with the region, which already exceeds $500 billion.
DW: US pushes Latin America trade as EU-Mercosur deal stalls – Tobias Käufer
Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva insisted this week that there are no remaining obstacles to signing the EU–Mercosur trade agreement next month after more than two decades of negotiations.
Speaking on the sidelines of the G20 summit in South Africa, Lula said the deal would represent “possibly the largest agreement” in global trade, citing both blocs’ nearly 722 million population and $22 trillion in gross domestic product (GDP).
But while EU trade representatives consider the Mercosur pact to be a done deal, France and Hungary are calling for last-minute changes, citing risks to their agricultural sectors.
And while the long-sought pact remains precarious, the US is stepping up efforts to sign trade deals of their own with several countries in the region.
