White House to Meet Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple on Virus
The meeting will be hosted by U.S. Chief Technology Officer Michael Kratsios
(Bloomberg) -- The White House will host a meeting Wednesday with Alphabet Inc.’s Google, Amazon.com Inc., Facebook Inc. and other tech companies to coordinate responses to the growing coronavirus outbreak.
The meeting will be hosted by U.S. Chief Technology Officer Michael Kratsios, according to a spokeswoman for the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Representatives of Microsoft Corp., Apple Inc., Twitter Inc. as well as officials from various federal agencies will also attend the session, said the spokeswoman, Elena Hernandez.
Social media companies in particular have been at the forefront of attempting to stop misinformation on the virus, while companies such as Amazon have attempted to manage panic selling of goods.
President Donald Trump has been critical of some of the companies, especially Amazon, whose founder, Jeff Bezos, also owns the Washington Post.
Some participants will attend via teleconference, Hernandez said.
The White House has been hosting a parade of industry executives to discuss how to deal with the coronavirus crisis.
To contact the reporter on this story: Ben Brody in Washington, D.C. at btenerellabr@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Sara Forden at sforden@bloomberg.net, John Harney
©2020 Bloomberg L.P.