Apple Lawsuit Re-Opens Claiming the Company’s App Store Is Monopolistic

A US appeals court has reopened another front in Apple’s far-flung legal wars. Last week, it ruled that iPhone app purchasers have standing to sue Cupertino over claims that the company acted monopolistically by preventing them from purchasing third-party apps outside the App Store. The group of plaintiffs claim that the practice drives up app prices and is anti-competitive.

The lawsuit was originally brought to federal court in 2012. It was dismissed in 2013 by a federal judge when Apple successfully argued that the consumers weren’t in a legal position to sue it because they had purchased the apps from developers. Cupertino also argued that developers set prices for their apps, whereas it merely rents out the space to host those apps in its App Store.

At the time, U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzales wrote that the plaintiffs failed to “allege facts showing that each named plaintiff has personally suffered an injury-in-fact based on Apple’s alleged conduct”, but noted that their complaint could be amended and refiled.

Now, Judge William A. Fletcher has ruled that iPhone users do purchase apps directly from Apple, according to Reuters, giving them the right to challenge Apple in court. The plaintiffs are calling on courts to “compel Apple to let people shop for applications wherever they want, which would open the market and help lower prices,” according to their attorney Mark C. Rifkin. “The other alternative is for Apple to pay people damages for the higher than competitive prices they’ve had to pay historically because Apple has utilized its monopoly.”

Apple controls its App Store ecosystem for quality and security according to an evolving set of guidelines, which could be influenced by the outcome of the lawsuit. The recent appeals court ruling only establishes that the group of iPhone users have the right to sue Apple. It doesn’t address whether Apple’s curation of its iOS ecosystem is monopolistic.

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