Australia hikes levy for tech giants that fail to strike local news deals

SYDNEY, Aug 3 : The Australian government has hiked a planned levy that will force tech giants to pay multimillion-dollar charges if they fail to strike commercial deals with local media outlets for news on their platforms.• The government said on Monday it increased the levy for its planned News Bargaining Incentive to 2.5 per cent from 2.25 per cent.• In a change from an earlier proposal, the tax would only be calculated from a tech company's advertising revenue, rather than its entire business revenue, the government said.• The levy applies to companies with a "significant" social media ​or search service in Australia, and local revenue exceeding A$250 million ($175.7 million), capturing Meta, Google and TikTok. • An exclusion for professional networking sites has also been removed, bri