The Federal Trade Commission today voted to revoke a 2015 policy statement that limited regulators from challenging companies for anticompetitive practices.

The Democratic-majority commission voted 3-2 in favor of scrapping the “Statement of Enforcement Principles,” which limited what the agency could do. For the most part, it prevented regulators from challenging companies with regard to “unfair methods of competition” if no violation of existing antitrust laws could be sufficiently proved. Those laws are the Sherman Act and the Clayton Act.

“In practice, the 2015 statement has doubled down on the agency’s longstanding failure to investigate and pursue unfair methods of competition,” Chair Lina Khan said, speaking at a public meeting for the first time since she took over.

Khan has been an outspoken critic of the power of Big Tech and her appointment is seen as a threat to what she and many others deem out of control monopolies. She said today that withdrawing from the statement is just the “start of our efforts” and in the coming months the commission will announce what kind of practices “warrant scrutiny.”

Previously, antitrust laws have focused mainly on anticompetitive mergers and business practices, but now the agency will have more scope to investigate less standard transgressions. This is seen by some factions of the business community as overreach.

“Consumers want companies to play fair, and companies want that too,” said the Chamber of Progress, a group that represents large firms, including Amazon.com Inc., Facebook Inc. and Google LLC. “The 2015 guidance has been a critical tool to ensure fair corporation behavior, and we encourage the FTC to amend rather than revoke its guidance.”

The technology think tank TechFreedom echoed that opinion, stating there is a danger in revoking “principles developed by the courts under antitrust law.” Others have expressed concern over the fact that the FTC hasn’t yet said clarity what the removal of the statement will mean, with Republican commissioner Christine Wilson asked if a new statement will replace the old one.

That remains to be seen, and so far comments have been rather vague, such as Commissioner Rohit Chopra’s assurance that now the FTC can “move past this period of perceived powerlessness.”

Photo: Anders Sandberg/Flickr