Judge allows antitrust lawsuit against Apple to proceed
By MICHAEL LIEDTKE
A federal judge has rebuffed Apple's request to throw out a U.S. government lawsuit alleging the technology trendsetter has built a maze of illegal barriers to protect the iPhone from competition and fatten its profit margins.
The 33-page opinion from U.S. District Judge Xavier Neals in New Jersey on Monday will enable an antitrust lawsuit that the U.S. Justice Department filed against Apple 15 months ago to proceed. Neals has set a timetable that could see the case come to trial in 2027.
Apple has sought to dismiss the lawsuit, arguing the Justice Department had distorted the contours of the smartphone market and made a series of other misinterpretations that warranted the case be thrown out.
But Neals decided there is enough evidence to support the Justice Department's market definitions and concluded the case's key allegations merited further examination at trial.
The case seeks to pierce the digital fortress that Apple Inc., based in Cupertino, California, has built around the iPhone, iPad and other products to create a so-called 'walled garden' allowing its hardware and software to mesh seamlessly for users.
The Justice Department alleges that walled garden has mostly turned into a shield against competition, creating market conditions that enable it to charge higher prices and stifle innovation.
The lawsuit 'sets forth several allegations of technological barricades that constitute anticompetitive conduct,' Neals wrote in his opinion. The judge also concluded the Justice Department had pointed toward enough areas of troubling conduct that raised the 'dangerous possibility' that Apple has turned the iPhone into an illegal monopoly.
In a Monday statement, Apple reiterated its position that the Justice Department's case 'is wrong on the facts and the law, and we will continue to vigorously fight it in court.'
The antitrust lawsuit isn't the only legal headache threatening to undercut its profits, which totaled $94 billion on sales of $295 billion in its fiscal year ending last September.
Another federal judge in April issued a civil contempt order banning Apple from collecting any fees from in-app transactions on the iPhone that are funneled through other options besides its once-exclusive payment processing system that charged commissions ranging from 15% to 30%.
Apple also could lose a more than $20 billion annual payment that it gets for making Google the default search tool on the iPhone and other products as part of another antitrust case brought by the Justice Department. A federal judge in Washington D.C. is considering whether to ban the deals with Apple as part of a shake-up being proposed to address Google's illegal monopoly in searc h.
Neals' decision to allow the Justice Department's antitrust case to proceed came on the same day that Apple was hit with a lawsuit by app maker Proton amplifying the accusations of wrongful conduct by the company. The lawsuit, which will seek to be certified as a class action presenting thousands of developers who have made iPhone apps, is asking for punitive damages against Apple, as well as a court order to dismantle its walled garden.
© Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
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The Diplomat
6 hours ago
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Few realize that South Korea bars foreign companies from exporting the mapping data necessary for digital map services. That may soon change. Every day hundreds of visitors step off the AREX train at Seoul Station, tap Google Maps, and discover that the blue-dot app they use everywhere from Berlin to Bangkok will not provide walking or driving directions in South Korea. Few realize that the country – alongside China, Iran, Syria, and only a handful of others – bars foreign companies from exporting centimeter-level mapping data. Even many South Koreans find out only when a friend messages, 'Why won't my phone show the route to your café?' That blind spot sits at the center of a policy battle now in its third round. Google petitioned Seoul in 2007 and 2016 for permission to copy 1:5,000-scale digital maps to its offshore servers; regulators said no both times. 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The Japanese government, for example, recently announced it is pausing trade negotiations after the U.S. demanded increased defense spending. On June 29, Trump suggested he would simply send letters to foreign nations setting a tariff rate. 'I'm going to send letters, that's the end of the trade deal,' he said. That does not bode well for countries negotiating in good faith. It's likely tariffs will be reimposed and bilateral negotiations will drag on to September or beyond, as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said. After all, even the U.S. government has limited bandwidth to process so many simultaneous negotiations. Category 2 trading partners will increasingly test their own political limits. And the rest of the world is hoping for a favorable Supreme Court ruling that may, like the character Godot in the play 'Waiting for Godot,' never come. This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.
