(July 8): Apple Inc lost a European Union court fight to stop its App Store and iPhone operating system being hit by the full force of the bloc’s antitrust crackdown on Big Tech.
Judges at the EU’s General Court in Luxembourg disagreed with Apple’s challenge to the services being targeted under the EU’s Digital Markets Act, saying regulators were right to draw the two services under the scope of the rules.
The court said it “confirms the designation of Apple as a gatekeeper in relation to the App Store and iOS and finds the actions concerning the iMessage service to be inadmissible".
In response to the ruling, an Apple spokesperson said that the company believes “the DMA’s mandate goes beyond what is lawful and proportionate, threatening to erode decades of privacy and security protections".
Apple — seen as the biggest renegade against the EU’s crackdown — had contested the application of the law on three fronts: EU obligations to make rival hardware work with its iPhone; the regulator’s decision to drag the hugely profitable App Store under the rules; and a decision to probe whether iMessage should have faced the rules, which it later escaped.
While Wednesday’s judgment can be appealed to the bloc’s top court, it could meanwhile embolden regulators’ appetite for reining in Silicon Valley firms using the DMA, which has drawn broad scorn both from Apple and Donald Trump’s White House.
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In a court hearing last year, Apple argued that the law “imposes hugely onerous and intrusive burdens” at odds with Apple’s rights in the EU marketplace.
At the time, those claims were rebuffed by the European Commission, with the bloc’s lawyers claiming Apple’s “absolute control” over the iPhone has allowed it to generate “supernormal profits in complementary markets where its competitors are handicapped and cannot compete with it on an equal footing".
The DMA came onto the EU’s books in 2023 and is designed to clip the wings of the world’s largest technology platforms with a slew of dos and don’ts. But since being enforced by Brussels regulators, the law has drawn the ire of US President Donald Trump and plagued EU-US trade talks.
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Apple’s App Store has so far faced a €500 million penalty for alleged violations — a fine which it is challenging separately.
Uploaded by Arion Yeow
