The US Justice Department and sixteen state and district attorneys have sued tech giant Apple. With this new antitrust lawsuit, the complainants have accused Apple of having an illegal monopoly in the smartphone industry.
The civil complaint filed in the New Jersey District Court accuses the company of suppressing developers and other rivals in order to eradicate competition.
The federal lawsuit directly targets the company’s most popular product, that is, the iPhone. Notably, the iPhone alone has helped significantly increase Apple’s valuation to over $2.7 trillion, making it a household name among billions.
The lawsuit, which consists of 88 pages, states:
Each step in Apple’s course of conduct built and reinforced the moat around its smartphone monopoly.
The cumulative effect of this course of conduct has been to maintain and entrench Apple’s smartphone monopoly at the expense of the users, developers, and other third parties who helped make the iPhone what it is today,
Meanwhile, the Department of Justice said that in order to keep consumers purchasing iPhones, Apple has indulged in a competition that is unethical and illegal. The company blocks cross-platform messaging apps and limits the compatibility of third-party wallet apps and smartwatches. It also negatively impacts non-app store programs and cloud streaming services.
This alleges that Apple’s anti-competitive measures are not only limited to the iPhone and Apple Watch but also to their advertising, browser, and FaceTime features. Soon after the suit was filed, the company’s shares fell by over 4%.
Apple, in response, denied all the accusations made by the US government, according to Reuters.
This lawsuit threatens who we are and the principles that set Apple products apart in fiercely competitive markets. If successful, it would hinder our ability to create the kind of technology people expect from Apple — where hardware, software, and services intersect,
the company said.
