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Apple was referred to a criminal prosecutor by a federal judge who found that the technology giant deliberately “thwarted” his legal order forcing him to modify his store rules in the United States.
The scathing order on Wednesday, in which the judge noted that Apple’s finance leaders lied under oath to cover an attempt to bypass the injunction, marked an amazing reprimand to the iPhone manufacturer and a new turn in his long legal battle with Epic games.
“”Apple voluntarily chosen not to comply. . . With the express intention of creating new anti -competitive obstacles which, by design and indeed, would maintain a valued source of income, “wrote the Federal Judge of California Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers.
It was “a raw calculation error,” she wrote. “As always, concealment has aggravated things.”
“The court refers to the case to the United States prosecutor for the Northern District of California to investigate the question of whether the criminal contempt is appropriate,” she wrote, adding that Apple must comply with the “immediately” injunction and abandon its new costs.
The injunction stems from a high -level antitrust trial of epic games deposited against Apple in 2020. The iPhone manufacturer largely beat the case in court and in subsequent calls.
But the company has always been faced with an injunction under Californian law, which forced it to modify the rules that prevent developers from directing customers outside the App Store, where they can avoid Apple overload on digital payments – up to 30% for certain products.
The Apple App Store is an integral part of its service activities and generated $ 8.6 billion in world revenue in the first quarter of the year, according to estimates by the sensor tower.
Apple may appeal against the prescription. He did not immediately respond to a request for comments.
The decision to refer a company to a criminal prosecutor in an antitrust civil affair was unusual, said Gary Bornstein, a lawyer for epic games. “I have never seen it before.”
Apple has changed its rules in response to the judge’s injunction, creating a mechanism to allow developers to direct consumers to shop outside the application, for example on the developer’s website. But he continued to request a 27% commission on these purchases by forcing developers to report sales to the company.
Epic Games said that this measure and others have taken discouraged developers to use the option and therefore violated the injunction. Several Apple leaders testified during a hearing in February on their efforts to comply. A first hearing in May 2024 was postponed after the judge asked for more internal documents from the iPhone manufacturer.
In his order on Wednesday, Gonzalez Rogers said that Apple had concocted his compliance plan in order to maintain a source of income of several billion dollars by creating new barriers to lock customers in his app store.
“To hide the truth, vice-president of finance, Alex Roman, pure and simple lied under oath,” wrote the judge. The documents discovered during the case revealed that “Apple knew exactly what it was doing and at each turn of the most anti -competitive option”.
Phil Schiller, an Apple senior executive who testified before the judge earlier this year, pleaded against Apple introducing new fees, said the judge.
But the director general Tim Cook “ignored Schiller and rather authorized [then] Financial director Luca Maestri and his financial team to convince him of the contrary, “said the judge.” Cook has chosen badly. »»
Maestri left his role as a financial director at the start of this year.
Wednesday, Tim Sweeney, CEO of Epic Games, said that the company would return its popular Fortnite Game to the App Store next week. Apple withdrew the store game when Epic deliberately bypassed its payment policies in August 2020.
Apple was faced with similar pressure in Europe compared to the rules of its store. Earlier this month, the EU A fine of the technological group 500 million euros Not to comply with the regulations that force it similarly to allow application developers to allow consumers to offer on its platform.
