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When users fork over money for an iPhone (average price: over $800), many expect to be able to play their favorite mobile game on it. They expect the apps they buy to work. Many users also expect to install apps that enhance their security and privacy beyond what Apple provides.
Users may not know or understand that Apple’s rules for the App Store can get in the way, by driving up app costs and limiting availability. Apple uses layers of digital locks to channel all app purchases and downloads through its App Store. Apple also requires that all in-app payments run through its own system, and siphons off a 30% cut. Users have no way of knowing, when they purchase a phone, how these policies can affect their current or future app experiences, including whether Apple will decide to kick an app out of the App Store altogether.
Yet, in the antitrust case Epic Games v. Apple, in which the maker of Fortnite alleges that Apple has an illegal monopoly in iOS app distribution, a court ruled that since customers supposedly understand Apple’s policies and buy iPhones anyway when they could choose an Android phone, there’s competition in the market for distributing apps, and Apple’s ability to wield monopoly power is checked by competition from Android.
The court got it wrong. That’s why EFF, along with attorneys from Constantine Cannon, filed an amicus brief siding with Epic Games in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, explaining that the trial court’s decision was contrary to law and defied the reality of mobile software distribution. The decision incorrectly presumed that, if customers are aware of the restrictions when purchasing a device, then competition in that market is sufficient to rein in Apple’s anticompetitive conduct and users are not locked into the App Store.
Here’s the background: Epic Games sued Apple for antitrust violations relating to its App Store policies. Epic is claiming that Apple’s exclusive control over app sales, and Apple’s requirement that all apps use Apple’s in-app payment system, are illegal under U.S. antitrust law. After a lengthy trial
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Read the original article: EFF to Appeals: Apple’s Monopoly Doesn’t Make Users Safer