Apple Facing Imminent U.S. Antitrust Lawsuit
The United States Justice Department is preparing to sue Apple for violating antitrust law as soon as Thursday, reports Bloomberg. The lawsuit will be the culmination of an investigation that initially started in 2019 as an antitrust review of major technology companies. U.S. regulators have already sued Google, Meta, and Amazon.
Over the last several years, Apple officials have met with the DoJ multiple times, and the investigation has covered everything from iMessage to ad practices. Some of what the DoJ has looked into:
- How the Apple Watch works better with iPhone than other smart watches do.
- How Apple locks competitors out of iMessage.
- How Apple blocks financial firms from offering tap-to-pay services similar to Apple Pay.
- Whether Apple favors its own apps and services over those provided by third-party developers.
- How Apple has blocked cloud gaming apps from the App Store.
- How Apple restricts the iPhone's location services from devices that compete with AirTag.
- How App Tracking Transparency impacted the collection of advertising data.
- In-app purchase fees collected by Apple.
Apple competitors like Tile, Beeper, Basecamp, Meta, and Spotify have had discussions with antitrust investigators to voice their complaints about Apple's practices, as have big banks. According to Bloomberg, the DoJ plans to argue that Apple has used illegal practices to maintain a dominant market position, blocking competitors from hardware and software features on the iPhone.
Back in 2020, a United States House Judiciary Subcommittee investigation concluded that Apple, Meta, Google, and Amazon have the "kinds of monopolies" last seen in "the era of oil barons and railroad tycoons." The subcommittee recommended new antitrust law, but the DoJ opted to target Google before going after Apple because Apple was embroiled in an antitrust lawsuit with Epic Games.
Apple in iOS 17.4 had to make sweeping changes to the way the App Store operates in the European Union to comply with the Digital Markets Act, and it was also recently fined $2 billion in Europe for anti-competitive behavior against rival music services.
Popular Stories
The iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are three months away, and there are plenty of rumors about the devices.
Below, we recap key changes rumored for the iPhone 17 Pro models as of June 2025:Aluminum frame: iPhone 17 Pro models are rumored to have an aluminum frame, whereas the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro models have a titanium frame, and the iPhone X through iPhone 14 Pro have a...
Apple will finally deliver the Apple Watch Ultra 3 sometime this year, according to analyst Jeff Pu of GF Securities Hong Kong (via @jukanlosreve).
The analyst expects both the Apple Watch Series 11 and Apple Watch Ultra 3 to arrive this year (likely alongside the new iPhone 17 lineup, if previous launches are anything to go by), according to his latest product roadmap shared with...
Alongside WWDC this week, Logitech announced notable new accessories for the iPad and Apple Vision Pro.
The Logitech Muse is a spatially-tracked stylus developed for use with the Apple Vision Pro. Introduced during the WWDC 2025 keynote address, Muse is intended to support the next generation of spatial computing workflows enabled by visionOS 26. The device incorporates six degrees of...
iPadOS 26 allows iPads to function much more like Macs, with a new app windowing system, a swipe-down menu bar at the top of the screen, and more. However, Apple has stopped short of allowing iPads to run macOS, and it has now explained why.
In an interview this week with Swiss tech journalist Rafael Zeier, Apple's software engineering chief Craig Federighi said that iPadOS 26's new Mac-like ...
Apple's iPhone development roadmap runs several years into the future and the company is continually working with suppliers on several successive iPhone models simultaneously, which is why we often get rumored features months ahead of launch. The iPhone 17 series is no different, and we already have a good idea of what to expect from Apple's 2025 smartphone lineup.
If you skipped the iPhone...
Apple today provided developers with a revised version of the first iOS 26 beta for testing purposes. The update is only available for the iPhone 15 and iPhone 16 models, so if you're running iOS 26 on an iPhone 14 or earlier, you won't see the revised beta.
Registered developers can download the new beta software through the Settings app on each device.
The revised beta addresses an...
Apple's Terminal app is getting a visual refresh in macOS Tahoe, and it's the first notable design update since the command-line tool debuted.
The updated Terminal will support 24-bit color and Powerline fonts, according to Apple's State of the Platforms presentation at WWDC25. The app will also adopt the new Liquid Glass aesthetic with redesigned themes that align with macOS 26's broader...
