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EU Probes Apple's Decision to Shut Down Epic's Developer Account
- akmarinov 3y agoWhat's Apple's reasoning here? An american subsidiary lied once and an american court said they didn't have to keep them around, so we kicked a european subsidiary out of the european mandated DMA. Yeah, that's gonna go over great with the EU. Apple really deserves the 10% of global revenue fine to be brought down a peg.
- thallium205 3y agoThey don’t want a litigious bad mouthing customer onboard so they fired them. It’s a story as old as time that happens daily.
- b800h 3y agoThat might work if you're a local plumber, but not if you're a massive global firm with a de-facto monopoly.
- pavlov 3y agoThings are different when you’re in antitrust crosshairs and have been designated a “gatekeeper” by new legislation that explicitly intends to force you to open your product to competitors. It’s not a great look when your first action in that gatekeeper role is to block access to a competitor because of actions the competitor’s parent company took years ago in another country and a different jurisdiction.
- zuppy 3y agoI would add that nobody asked them to create the need to have a business relation with the external appstore. Although I don’t necessarily think it’s a good thing to allow external appstores, this is the law now and they have to comply with it.
- lettergram 3y ago> this is the law now and they have to comply with it. lol ugh, it’s the law to wear a seatbelt, I can choose to ignore it. One ironic part I like to mention about this is that tractors tell you not to wear a seat belt. That lets you bail if it’s tipping over. The thing is, it’s still technically illegal not wearing a seat belt. Ironically, riding a motorbike requires no seatbelt… and overall is more unsafe, but totally fine apparently. The point I’m making is laws aren’t hard constraints, they’re human constructs and you can choose to ignore them. There may be consequences to ignoring them. But the calculus for Apple is that it’s worth it to them and to ignore. Much like the farmer with the tractor, minimal risk to ignore. High risk to follow law.
- tpm 3y ago> laws aren’t hard constraints, they’re human constructs As is Apple, the company. It only exists on paper. It can be barred from existing in a jurisdiction by another human construct, a court ruling. It can choose to ignore EU laws, but there would be consequences.
- prmoustache 3y agoThe farmer do whatever he wants within its field, the road laws don't apply there. But he has to follow the laws when he is on the road where a tractor has no reason to tip over. Your analogy is not relevant here.
- josefx 3y ago> The thing is, it’s still technically illegal not wearing a seat belt Check if the law in your state actually applies to a tractor. Some states explicitly list which motor vehicles the law applies to.
- _cenw 3y agoLast action, they terminated Epic one day before the DMA went into effect (today). It's clearly meant to stall the creation of Epic's own App Store. All the processes still require an Apple developer account. This is malicious enough that I hope the EU regulators pull all strings to make Apple's fine for this not just aedequate to the money they're saving, but also to account for the disregard of the law itself. The EU isn't the boring cyberpunk future where corporations can do whatever they want Apple thinks it is.
- madsbuch 3y ago> Last action, they terminated Epic one day before the DMA went into effect (today). The law went into effect november 1st 2022[0]. Until yesterday has been a grace period to allow big companies time to implement the law - I must say that 1 year and 4 months is generous. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Markets_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Markets_Act
- _cenw 3y agoSure, if you want to be pedantic about it. Though this is pretty normal for EU law to give a lot of preparation time. The GDPR had 2 entire years - and I still got some emergency compliance tickets in the week before (worked at the eCommerce arm of a major German retailer).
- madsbuch 3y agoThis is not being pedantic? Apple is currently fully liable under the DMA. Especially for new initiatives, which what happened yesterday indeed was.
- scottfr 3y agoEpic is not a customer of Apple. Many of Apple's customers are also customers of Epic. Apple is trying to prevent those shared customers from accessing Epic.
- Retric 3y agoYou can call Apple a customer or supplier of Epic, but it's just semantics they do have a business relationship. The deeper point is companies get rid of litigious business partners whenever possible. It's one reason why you end up regulating utilities, nobody wants the electric company to have excessive control over the local economy. Where exactly digital platforms sit on this spectrum is probably a question for legislators not the courts.
- madsbuch 3y agoI think very few developers wish to be customers of Apple. But Apple gatekeeps the platform developers need to publish on. It is this relations that is the core of DMA, and which DMA seeks to change.
- Seanambers 3y agoThey do not need, they want and they don't want to pay Apple.
- madsbuch 3y agoThis is ridiculous. If you develop a game that needs to be available on all major platforms, Apple devices are a part of them. Are you also one of the people, who would argue, that you can build you own road network, if you don't like the terms on the current road network? Luckily it is not you who are going to work on these regulations, but people who actually care about free markets (how ironic that the EU is the progressive one on the question of freedom).
- Seanambers 3y agoThere is such a thing as a private road. This is not about access. This is about money, and to think the EU - the geniuses who gave us all GDPR pop ups - don't have a intrinsic interest in devaluing Apples ecosystem is delusional.
- andylynch 3y agoEnabling adverse risk interoperability is a main point of the Digital Markets Act.
- misnome 3y ago> an american court said they didn't have to keep them around They also said that they didn’t have to keep any subsidiaries around. It’s not even _pretending_ to be an independent subsidiary.
- voidUpdate 3y agoDidn't Epic Games violate the app store ToS a while back? I'm not a fan of Apple but it still seems reasonable to me to terminate a developer account for breaking ToS
- JanSt 3y agoYou can't just use your ToS to circumvent the law of the market you operate in. If they have to allow Epic to operate in the EU under the DMA they can't kick them out unless it's in compliance with EU law. The EU law overpowers Apple's ToS.
- jsnell 3y agoIt's not reasonable when Apple has set up artificial roadblocks whereby Epic can't compete with Apple in the iOS app store market without a developer account. As of yesterday, Apple is legally mandated to enable competition in that market, so using those roadblocks to aggressively block competition is a pretty big problem. Apple could easily resolve this by just removing their their bogus constraints around the requirements for launching a competing app store on iOS. After that they could probably keep Epic banned all they want from the main App Store based on future ToS violations. (Though with the caveat that the ToS would need to be reasonable, and it seems clear that Apple has no intent of making a reasonable ToS unless forced). But they're not going to do that, are they? None of Apple's restrictions were about security or user safety, they were always intended as an exclusionary measures, to make sure nobody can launch a viable competing store. When it looked like Epic was going to do it despite the ridiculous business terms, Apple reached for the next excuse in their toolbox.
- prmoustache 3y agoWell it seems reasonable to me they terminate their developer account ONLY AND ONLY IF a developer account is not mandatory to be able to have a foot in the iOS market. Apple has the responsibility to safeguard apps delivered by its own store, but it will be each third party store responsibility to do the same while also complying to EU laws.
- jemmyw 3y agoMy understanding is that they had to break the ToS to take it to court. I mean they could have taken it to court anyway but they wouldn't have had standing.
- stingraycharles 3y agoA US judge ruled that Epic has a pattern of “malicious compliance”. Epic created a new account in Sweden so they can create an App Store in the EU. Apple used the judge’s reasoning of a pattern of malicious compliance to preemptively shut down Epic’s account. Because they believe Epic will not play by the rules. So it’s a kind of pre-crime reasoning, they’re shutting down Epic’s account before they can do anything wrong. And probably also because Epic publicly criticized Apple’s malicious compliance around the EU rulings.
- margana 3y agoThe thing here is that the potential "crime" they were trying to prevent is opening an App Store in the EU, which EU literally forced Apple to allow. So if this was the reasoning, then Apple is the one breaking the law here.
- prmoustache 3y agoIsn't “malicious compliance” the business model of Apple and most successful companies?
- laserlight 3y agoCan you expand what Apple has done to count “malicious compliance”?
- lagadu 3y agoBreaking PWAs is the most recent example but the most well known was their (now dead and buried) attempt to circumvent USB charging requirements.
- bmicraft 3y agoEverything they've done around the right to repair
- laserlight 3y ago
- throwaway2990 3y ago[flagged]
- pavlov 3y agoIMHO it needs to keep getting in the way. On many occasions it has been tremendously helpful to consumers when the EU stepped up and got in the way of companies doing as they please. Examples include capping phone roaming charges and mandating 24/7 free money transfers.
- aurareturn 3y agoOn the other hand, the world has collectively wasted millions of hours creating and clicking on cookie prompts.
- pavlov 3y agoEven Apple implemented the equivalent of the cookie prompt — the mandatory “Allow App to Track” dialog on iOS. So the idea clearly wasn’t all that bad. IMO the problem was that the EU law left it up to websites to police cookies, but it should be part of the browser instead — just like Apple’s tracker permission dialog for iOS native apps is part of the operating system.
- speeder 3y agoI will repeat, again, what I say when I see people commenting about this with such bad take. It is the US companies that do this. The worst cookie banners all come from US companies. Examples: "Admiral" one of the biggest cookie banner company is from Florida. Their banner is absolutely annoying, made to trick you into consenting to be tracked. Many USA healthcare sites, refuse to work entirely if you decline marketing tracking cookies (yes you read that correctly, healthcare sites kick you out if you want privacy about your health). The crazy thing is, the law never said you must have a cookie banner, what the law says is: you are not allowed to spy on people, UNLESS they allow it explicitly. So USA companies that are not big on privacy for some reason, concluded that annoying cookie banners where is easy to accidentally give away your privacy is a great idea. If your site doesn't track users, you don't need any banner, not even a disclaimer. Just don't spy on people, and that is it. I wonder how people from USA can still claim with a straight face they are "the land of the free", when they aren't free to not be spied upon (by their own government even, as Snowden proved).
- shreyansh_k 3y ago[dead]
- nippoo 3y agoThey're global companies, not American ones. EU consumers lose out by Apple's decision. If you want to trade in Europe you've gotta pay by the antitrust rulebook.
- Trafz 3y agoBasically, when non-EU companies operate within EU, they have to follow EU's rules and regulations. EU might suspect something that goes against those.
- agluszak 3y agoBecause what these two American companies are doing affects a lot of EU citizens.
- RandomLensman 3y agoWhy is the US at times poking its nose into European businesses? On both cases (EU or US): because 1) they can, and 2) they think it is related to their remit.
- datadeft 3y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Territorial_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Territorial_principle
- dantondwa 3y agoBecause those companies chose to operate in the EU. Regulating its market is one of its main tasks, and certainly not a waste of time. That depends on the perspective. From the perspective of a company abusing its market dominance, it is indeed a pain. For the perspective of companies which are not dominant and consumers, it is really desirable for the EU to be active in this field.
- Mashimo 3y agoBy that logic Bayer should not get sued for RoundUp in America because it's an German company :D A bit silly
- TheAceOfHearts 3y agoI don't understand what Apple executives are even thinking to keep engaging in these actions. How do they justify continuing to burn bridges with developers and tarnish their reputation in the public eye?
- rapsey 3y agoTheir market share makes them arrogant. They are very much like Microsoft in the 90s.
- graemep 3y agoMicrosoft did not suffer much as a result. They mostly got away with anti-competitive behaviour.
- benreesman 3y agoThey got a very stiff warning that they would be allowed a major role in shaping the Web, but that strangling it outright would be the end of them. Imperfect, but enough.
- prmoustache 3y agoHonestly they had it easy because of inertia and because they managed to build a successful business with cloud technology. Had they failed with Gaming, Office365 + Azure the same way they failed in the mobile market, Microsoft would not be the same company as it is today and as it was 20 years ago.
- tempodox 3y agoDespots and bullies are the same everywhere. They bully while they can.
- _cenw 3y agoThankfully EU legislation has very severe penalties built-in that are mostly deterrants (think the 4% turnover maximum GDPR fine), but if anyone deserves to be hit with the full force of the law, it's Apple. Even Meta, who are also happy to rack up fines instead of fixing their privacy issues, aren't this reckless.
- ankit219 3y agoThink Apple's argument about Epic having previously flouted the rules openly might be good enough. For a third party app store, Apple is pretty much giving the keys to your phone to the said app store. If there is a company which has demonstrated they won't play by the rules, it's not a huge stretch to say that it may harm the security of the model. While the EU wants the company/iphone to be more open, it also puts the onus of keeping it secure on the company itself. Another reason I believe they are on sure footing is that they got the rejection from the law firm, which I presume knows what they are doing, just as they did during the 2020 shenanigans from Epic.
- goosedragons 3y agoThere shouldn't be rules from the manufacturer about what a third party app store can do. If so, this scheme is already a complete failure.
- ankit219 3y agoHow do you ensure security of a device without rules from a manufacturer?
- jocaal 3y agoThrough security enhancing features in the operating system, like not allowing processes to access other's memory spaces. Or prompting users to allow an application to use potentially harmful api's. What do you think is the role of an operating system?
- ben_w 3y agoGiven one of the things you can get on an app store is a replacement keyboard, "security" is, in addition to all the things you listed, "make sure there are no installable key-loggers". And for web browsers, which are basically an inner-OS, making sure that plug-ins can't read arbitrary content from the pages you visit. And given that "phone" is an app, that it can't wiretap all your calls. Also, one of the fights between Apple and Facebook was basically stuff which, by my reading, was stuff Facebook wanted to do which was illegal under GDPR: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/02/facebook-says-apple-ios-privacy-change-will-cost-10-billion-this-year.html https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/02/facebook-says-apple-ios-priv... There's also stuff which is bad for the device, but I'm not sure if it really ought to be Apple's responsibility to prevent, like crypto miner libraries running on-device as an income stream for the developer.
- JanSt 3y agoReally interesting to see how hard Apple is fighting with everything they have to keep their profits and not open up. This is a fight Apple can't win because the EU will strike back again and again. It's Apple trying to win time and thus bank profits. But I believe the strategy will fail hard: high fines and even tighter regulations that will break up Apple's monopoly completely, much broader than intented before. The more actions like this one Apple takes to squash competition, the stronger the rules will be that will be forced upon them.
- _cenw 3y agoAt this point I'm wondering what happens if the EU invokes their malicious compliance clause, and tells Apple outright what to do. Will they just refuse and hope they don't lose the EU market? I think one point lost in most of these conversations is that the existence of an open iOS will spawn a lot of "change your region to Europe" how-to articles in the rest of the world, creating an escape hatch from the walled garden (and finally a good reason to use a VPN), similar to what Apple keeps attacking sideloading for. Maybe they'd rather keep control of their other markets than be in the EU one.
- JanSt 3y agoRefusing is moot. They make $3bn profit every month in the EU. Shareholders would certainly send Cook off if Apple loses access to the EU market. Apple will play this game until the EU takes the gloves off, and they will.
- rapsey 3y agoThere is zero chance of Apple abandoning the EU market. It is simply too large.
- rekoil 3y agoI agree, but it is Apple's perogative if they want to go that way, that's an alternative to DMA compliance.
- newbie578 3y agoTime for the fines to start accumulating. I am all for making an example out of Apple. Monopolistic behavior needs to be punished.
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- throw623424 3y ago[flagged]
- supermatt 3y agoApple must have realised this would provide direct evidence of their control over the iOS app market, regardless of their apparent compliance with the DMA. The loss of a developer account means that epic cant even release their own app store on apple devices, undermining apples responsibility to open up to competition. Cant wait to see how big the next fine is *grabs popcorn*
- JanSt 3y agoYeah it could even lead the EU to mandate that no business relation to Apple is required to operate your store and Apple has no saying whatsoever over you and may not charge you for installs, updates etc. Also, no penalties or changes may be applied to Apps choosing to use other stores. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. This might lead to a complete opening-up of the iPhone as a result for the EU market.
- dns_snek 3y agoThis is why their petulant behavior, as brazen as it is, doesn't really bother me. Every action they take just provides further evidence and support for further anti-trust action that will affect the entire big tech industry. Now it's up to the regulators to deliver on enforcement and take a bite out of the poisoned apple.
- lenkite 3y agoI am not so confident. Apple has a lot of Senators and Members of Congress on its payroll. This could easily lead to the U.S. government putting considerable pressure on the EU to ease-off on Apple and the regulators de-clawed. This might likely be accompanied with lots of media articles and talking points about terrible EU regulations that are suppressing good & successful U.S. companies.
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- anon373839 3y agoApple’s recent behavior in Europe sure is perplexing to me. The arrogance suggests a kind of legal naïveté that a $2.6T multinational can’t possibly have. It must be a calculation. Do they figure Washington will pull strings to bail them out of their predicament?
- lagadu 3y agoMuch like the usb charging situation, it's a delaying tactic. Of course they're aware that this isn't something they can win but they can fight and delay it for as long as possible in order to both have some profits from it while it lasts and to weaken the competitor's (in this case Epic) position by delaying their entry in the market.
- anon373839 3y agoIf so, I hope Europe prices the fines high enough to make the strategy backfire.
- the8472 3y agoJust a few days ago the EU fined apple for 40 million over a different issue. And then tacked 1.8 billion onto the basic fine as a deterrent.
- blashyrk 3y ago[dead]