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Italy’s Watchdog Probes Apple Over Competition In App Market

By  |  May 11, 2023

Italy’s antitrust authority is investigating claims of Apple’s potential abuse of its dominant app market position, which may impede competition, according to Forbes. 

According to the watchdog, a double standard has been implemented since April 2021. It states that users of non-Apple apps are prompted more prominently to provide consent for data tracking from third-party developers than Apple’s own products.

According to the regulator, third-party app prompts use stronger language compared to native Apple apps, which may discourage users from opting into tracking.

Read more: Russia Fines Apple For App Market Abuse

According to AGCM, third-party app developers have limited abilities to profile users and track the effectiveness of ad campaigns compared to Apple. This is due to the fact that Apple provides these developers with less comprehensive tools, which contain less information than the ones it uses internally.

The regulator stated that Apple’s actions could potentially harm third-party developers by reducing their ad revenues and diverting competition towards Apple’s own products.