Judge rules Apple violated injunction with continued anticompetitive practices

May 1, 2025

Apple has been referred for a criminal contempt investigation after a US district judge ruled the company continued anticompetitive practices on the App Store, despite a previous injunction.

Epic Games won the injunction in 2021 to stop Apple’s anticompetitive behaviour after the court ordered Apple to allow external payment options on the App Store.

The Fortnite creator argued that App Store customers should be able to access third-party payment and criticised Apple’s commission of up to 30% on purchases, claiming the App Store was monopolistic.

At the time, Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers of the US District Court for the Northern District of California ruled that Apple could no longer stop developers from linking to their own payment systems within the App Store.

The ruling also applied beyond games, meaning Apple’s movie streaming service had to direct customers to subscribe via its own website rather than through Apple’s payment system.

This allowed apps to bypass the 30% commission Apple charges on App Store purchases, potentially offering services at lower prices.

In the latest case, Gonzalez Rogers ruled that Apple continued to stifle competition with tactics the court said “will not be tolerated.”

The court found Apple had introduced a new system requiring apps with external sales to pay a 27% commission and had deployed pop-up warnings that discouraged users from paying elsewhere, suggesting those payments might not be secure.

In addition, she said Apple's vice president of finance Alex Roman "outright lied under oath".

In response, Gonzalez Rogers barred Apple from taking commissions on sales made outside the App Store and banned the company from enforcing rules that could stop developers from adding buttons or links for third-party payments.

She also ruled that Apple could no longer display messages designed to dissuade users from making purchases elsewhere and referred Apple to the US attorney for the Northern District of California to investigate potential criminal contempt.

Following the ruling, Epic Games founder and CEO Tim Sweeney announced that Fortnite would return to the US iOS App Store the next week.

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