Oracle Corporation Funds Dark Money Groups Fighting Big Tech

Internet Accountability Project gets backing from Oracle Corporation

Background

When the Internet Accountability Project (IAP) popped up late last year [2019] and joined the growing crusade against Big Tech, the nonprofit group refused to say who was financing it.

As it turns out, at least one of its IAP's benefactors is Oracle Corporation.

Last year [2019] Oracle donated between $25,000 and $99,999 to the internet project, according to a new political-giving report Oracle posted on its website. IAP calls itself a conservative nonprofit advocating for tougher privacy rules and stronger antitrust enforcement against the internet giants.

The IAP financing is just one part of an aggressive, and sometimes secretive, battle Oracle has been waging against its biggest rivals, including Amazon.com Inc., and Alphabet Inc.'s Google.

Oracle spent years fighting to unseat Amazon as the front-runner for a lucrative Pentagon cloud contract [Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI)], which was awarded to Microsoft Corp. in October 2019.

The Redwood City, California, company [Oracle Corporation] has also been locked in a decade-long legal dispute with Google, claiming the search-engine giant violated Oracle copyrights by including some Java programming code in the Android phone. Oracle acquired Java's developer, Sun Microsystems Inc., in 2010.

Earlier this month, IAP filed an amicus brief supporting Oracle's position in the case. IAP said it wants to "ensure that Google respects the copyrights of Oracle and other innovators." The U.S. Supreme Court on March 24 2020 will hear oral arguments in the Google v. Oracle America case.

The Donald Trump administration on Feb. 19 2020 also urged the Supreme Court to reject Google's appeal in the case. Its brief appeared the same day that Larry Ellison, Oracle's co-founder and chairman, hosted a high-dollar fundraiser at his Rancho Mirage estate for President Donald Trump. The event prompted about 300 Oracle employees to stage a protest the next day. The U.S. had previously supported Oracle as the case wound its way through the courts.

Oracle's donations disclosure reveals that it contributed to at least four other groups that filed supportive briefs in the Supreme Court case. Google has also donated money to at least 10 groups that have filed briefs on its behalf in the high court case.

Oracle and Amazon didn't immediately respond to requests for comment about the Oracle disclosure. Google declined to comment.

Internet Accountability Project (IAP) President Mike Davis said in a statement the group doesn't disclose its financial backers but specified that Oracle didn't fund its Supreme Court brief.

The internet project was launched in September by Mike Davis, a former aide to Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa, and Rachel Bovard, a former aide to Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky. The group aims to "lend a conservative voice to the calls for federal and state governments to rein in Big Tech before it is too late," according to its website.

The IAP is a Section 501(c)(4), known as a "social-welfare" organization. That designation means it isn't required to disclose donors as long, as it doesn't spend more than half of its money on campaign advertisements or activities to sway an election.

Among other policies, IAP supports curtailing Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 (CDA), which shields tech companies from liability for content that users post on their platforms. The clause saves tech companies from having to review content before it's published online, and then shields them from lawsuits if that content turns out to be problematic.

In interviews and on social media, IAP has supported Republican Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri, who has proposed that tech companies lose the legal immunity unless they can prove to the Federal Trade Commission that they treat their content in a politically neutral manner.

Since September 2019, IAP has tweeted at least 11 times about Hawley's legislative efforts against Google and other tech companies. Other IAP tweets highlight instances in which Google-funded groups fought on the internet giant's behalf.

"Holy smokes you guys, D.C. is awash in @Google money," Rachel Bovard tweeted in September [2019].

Other Campaigns

The Internet Accountability Project (IAP) is far from the only anti-tech group Oracle Corporation has funded. It also gave between $25,000 and $99,999 to the Free and Fair Markets Initiative, according to the disclosure.

The Free and Fair Markets Initiative claims it is a grassroots coalition of businesses and advocacy groups fighting for a better economy. In practice, it has focused more on publicizing negative reports about Amazon. The Wall Street Journal reported that Oracle, Walmart Inc. and the Simon Property Group had financed Free and Fair Markets Initiative.

For the last two years, Oracle has also waged a multi-front battle against Amazon over the Pentagon's Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) cloud contract. The deal, which could be worth $10 billion over a decade, is designed to transition much of the Pentagon's data into one commercially operated cloud system.

Amazon was seen as the leading contender because it had already won a major cloud contract with the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and had obtained high levels of security clearance. The move to Amazon's cloud would have threatened Oracle's legacy database business with the Defense Department.

Oracle led a coalition of other tech companies, including Microsoft Corp. and International Business Machines Corp., to oppose the Pentagon's decision to award the contract to a sole bidder. In addition to lobbying Congress and the Trump administration, Oracle also filed - and lost - challenges through the Government Accountability Office and the U.S. Court of Federal Claims.

Oracle is currently appealing a July [2019] ruling that it lacked standing to challenge the contract.

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