As regulators from the U.S. to South Korea zero in on Apple’s high-margin apps business, Apple may soon be forced to loosen its grip on its App Store.
Daniel Howley for Yahoo Finance:
The EU is expected to approve its Digital Markets Act (DMA), a landmark piece of legislation that should free developers from Apple’s fees.
Apple contends the App Store, and its fees, protect hundreds of millions of iPhone users from malware and scams. But with the Digital Markets Act seemingly set to become law, and legislators in the U.S. and other countries prepared to take a bat to the company’s App Store practices, Apple might finally lose control of its famed walled garden.
The company collects 15% from developers that make less than $1 million a year, while the larger 30% fee hits developers that make more than $1 million.
Those fees come into effect when developers use Apple’s in-app payment system. The catch is that developers can only use Apple’s payment system. If they try to use their own, Apple will boot their Apps from the App Store like it did to Epic’s “Fortnite.”
Apple, meanwhile, argues that its App Store fees, and strict limits on how users can install apps, come down to the price of maintaining the store and user privacy.
During a November talk at Web Summit, Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering, Craig Federighi, said that forcing the company to allow users to install apps from third-party sources, known as sideloading, would endanger consumers and hurt Apple’s image… According to Federighi, iOS devices usually don’t get infected with malware because Apple’s App Store is the only place users can get apps for their devices. As a result, Apple vets every iOS app out there, ensuring they aren’t hiding malware.
MacDailyNews Take: Hopefully, if and when Apple is forced to allow sideloading, it can be done in such a way as to protect iPhone and iPad users who enjoy the walled garden and the protections it offers – a major reason why millions upon millions of users chose Apple’s iPhoen and iPad products in the first place.
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