The Federal Trade Commission is seeking the public’s input on whether Big Tech firms like Google and Facebook parent Meta censor their users, the agency announced on Thursday.

Shadowbanning, demonetizing may violate consumer protection, competition laws under FTC purview, new agency chair warns. Section 230 "advisory opinion" could send Big Tech investors fleeing, columnist forecasts.

“Tech firms should not be bullying their users,” said FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson, recently chosen by President Trump to lead the commission. “This inquiry will help the FTC better understand how these firms may have violated the law by silencing and intimidating Americans for speaking their minds.”

Some news organizations are calling it a "power grab" by the White House. Talk of court challenges has already emerged. President Trump has used "the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America" to issue an Executive Order "ensuring accountability" for the FCC.

A new executive order from Trump expands presidential oversight of independent regulatory agencies like the FCC and FTC

The FTC announcement said that "censorship by technology platforms is not just un-American, it is potentially illegal." Tech platforms' actions "may harm consumers, affect competition, may have resulted from a lack of competition, or may have been the product of anti-competitive conduct," the FTC said.

FCC chair Brendan Carr on Thursday opened a probe into diversity practices at Verizon and raised the company's ongoing effort to purchase Frontier.