Google, Facebook and Twitter scramble to hold Washington at bay

Facebook has hired two crisis PR firms, and it plans to bring on as many as 1,000 people to screen ads

Google summoned about 200 policy staff from around the world last month for a debate on whether the company’s size has made it too attractive as a target for government regulators.
 
The two-day retreat in Monterey, California, where employees from the $682-billion company plied Washington policy experts with questions about the pros and cons of its size, took place as Google confronts European antitrust claims and proposed US legislation that would increase online publishers’ liability for content produced by others.
 
This week, the Alphabet unit disclosed new information that could further roil the regulatory picture: Revelations that Russian-linked