Antitrust watchdogs are going back to school to study blockchain and AI.

[Malam90]

Competition authorities are hitting the books when it comes to emerging technologies like blockchain and AI.

On Tuesday, the Department of Justice announced that it would be participating in a new initiative at Stanford University to onboard more advanced technological tools into its fight against monopolies.

The DoJ is merely the most vocal addition to Standord’s Computational Antitrust project. It joins the competition watchdogs of 46 other countries and the U.S.’s Federal Trade Commission.

The announcement is part of a broad surge in interest in cutting-edge tech and antitrust law, the culmination of a lot of motion at both academia and global regulators. Also on Tuesday, the DoJ’s antitrust leader, Makan Delrahim, gave a farewell address at Duke University’s Center on Science & Technology Policy in which he entreated the antitrust division to update it’s technological capabilities. In remarks from August, Delrahim had put forward blockchain’s ability to decentralize information as critical to the future of antitrust. Source