A Democratic senator has accused Europe of using antitrust cases to disguise its own technology interests, the latest exchange in an ongoing tussle between American tech giants and European governments over privacy.

Virginia’s Mark Warner locked horns with former European digital commissioner Neelie Kroes, who appeared alongside him at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The senator questioned the motives behind the EU’s plans for pan-European data privacy rules.

“The actions of the EU may have been industrial policy saying, ‘We want to try and support more European tech in the guise of anti-trust’, or for security concerns, saying, ‘We have to locate servers in certain places in terms of locating information’,” he said.

“That is more about 20th century nationalistic policy than about technology.”

Kroes headed the EU’s high-profile case against Microsoft, among others, during her decade-long tenure at the European commission, a case that set a precedent for the current antitrust investigation against Google. Microsoft was eventually fined a total of €1.64bn (about $1.8bn) for anticompetitive practices.

“I am a strong believer in competition,” Kroes responded. “You are not doing the best for innovation if you are a monopolist. Antitrust is not against the companies – that is not the goal. The goal is to give consumers the right products, in quality and price.”

“I was fighting like hell that it was European competition policy [not national policy], otherwise it doesn’t work.”

Google recently has stepped up its fight against the EU case, enlisting EU and US politicians and officials to lobby on its behalf, a Guardian investigation found.



Warner said regulation had created a business environment that had allowed innovative new sharing economy companies to develop but that regulation should be collaborative whether concerning security, privacy or the issues around wearables and health data.



“We could do more on healthcare reform by talking to tech companies than with some of the legislation we have done on the floor,” he said.



On the debates surrounding the exploding sharing economy, Warner said: “The gig economy is still early enough that if we challenge the tech community and not think about this as a traditional Republican v Democrat, right v left issue … we can find solutions outside Washington.”

“Folks want some social insurance … this is an opportunity to rethink the social contract between an employer and a person who works.”

Kroes said it was imperative that Europe protect labour rights in the face of gig economy firms, which she described as “an attack on democracy”. Describing the different social values between Europe and the US, she said that her 10 years in Brussels and the Netherlands had confirmed the principle of protecting people.

Warner pointed to southern Virginia, traditionally an economy built on tobacco, textiles and furniture, as an example of a community that needed to share in the rewards of the growing tech industry. “We must make sure this transformation doesn’t just take place in vibrant communities … but that innovation is spread around the country and the world. The bubbling up of innovation needs to be dispersed.”

Warner also described America’s tax system as “dysfunctional” and said that with $18.5tn of debt, the US does not generate the revenues it needs to make investments in education and public infrastructure, which he said is at historic lows.

He also commented on immigration and criticised strict rules that prevent talented students from staying in the US after they complete their study.

“Immigration reform is essential for economic prosperity,” he said. “One thing that I hope we maintain is that no matter where you come from, America has truly been the one place where you can move here and become a first generation American.”

That would not be true in India or France, he said: “It is part of the secret sauce of our country.”