Apple responds to UK’s App Store proposal: ‘We're concerned these EU-style rules…’

Apple has voiced strong opposition to the UK’s plans to increase competition in the mobile operating system market, warning that the proposals could harm user privacy and developers. According to a report, the tech giant said the measures may also force it to share its proprietary technology with foreign competitors without compensation.

Apple says proposal will limit innovation

According to a report by news agency Reuters, Apple said that designating the company "strategic market status" will undermine the privacy and security protections its users have come to expect and limit the company's ability to innovate.“We're concerned these

EU-style rules

the UK is advancing are bad for users and bad for developers,” an Apple spokesperson said.Last month, Britain's competition regulator, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), called on Apple and Google to adopt a fairer approach to app distribution on their platforms, meanwhile, considering designating both companies with a “strategic market status” over what it sees as their mobile operating system duopoly.

“This approach undermines the privacy and security protections our users have come to expect, hampers our ability to innovate, and forces us to give away our technology for free to foreign competitors,” the spokesperson added.

What CMS wants Apple and Google to do in the UK

The CMA's roadmap for the sector prioritizes measures like interoperability, which would require Apple to make its systems more compatible with third-party apps and services, like opening the App Store to let developers direct users to make purchases outside the platform.Apple argues these changes could expose users to scams and reduce its ability to invest in new technologies.In response, a CMA spokesperson said that Britain's approach to digital market regulation is designed to be more flexible and proportionate than the European Union's model. “Driving greater competition on mobile platforms need not undermine privacy, security or intellectual property,” the spokesperson said.