US v. Apple: everything you need to know – The Verge

Apple fights to keep DOJ antitrust suit from reaching trial

2024-11-20T18:09:19-05:00

Apple urged a federal judge to dismiss the Department of Justice's antitrust case against it, saying the government's complaint includes speculative arguments and the government doesn't plausibly argue it has monopoly power.

"The court is allowed to use common sense," countered DOJ counsel Jonathan Lasken at a hearing in New Jersey on Wednesday. "We're here today based on the idea that it's not plausible that [Apple] has monopoly power, but instead is at the mercy of supposed global behemoths who are a fraction of its size."

The government and more than a dozen states sued Apple earlier this year for maintaining an illegal monopoly in the …

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Apple files motion to dismiss DOJ antitrust lawsuit

2024-08-01T15:32:47-04:00

Apple has asked a federal judge to dismiss the Justice Department's antitrust case against it, claiming that the government is asking the court "to sanction a judicial redesign of one of the most innovative and consumer-friendly products ever made: iPhone."

The DOJ and 16 state and district attorneys general claimed in their March lawsuit that Apple has illegally monopolized the US smartphone market. The government claimed Apple broke the law by maintaining a closed ecosystem for the iPhone in pursuit of profits and at the expense of consumers and innovation. The government pointed to several examples in its complaint, including allegedly s …

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The DOJ Antitrust Division isn’t afraid to go to court

2024-07-15T09:00:00-04:00

When the Department of Justice released its more than 70-page lawsuit against Apple, its narrative read more like a docudrama than a stodgy legal document. It dropped the reader right into a 2010 exchange between an Apple executive and then-CEO Steve Jobs, who were just beginning to recognize how easy it was for customers to switch to their rivals' products - unless they did something to stop it. This kind of writing, sometimes called a speaking complaint, is a far cry from the rote retelling you often find in lawsuits.

That's not a surprise once you know that Hetal Doshi, lead of the nascent litigation program within the Antitrust Division …

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Apple’s antitrust case is getting a new judge

2024-04-10T17:59:37-04:00

The Department of Justice's massive antitrust case against Apple will unfold before a new judge. A court filing on Wednesday reveals that Judge Michael E. Farbiarz has determined his "recusal is necessary" under the code of conduct for US Judges.

The filing says Farbiarz's "disqualification is mandatory and cannot be remitted by the parties." Judge Julien Xavier Neals, whom President Joe Biden nominated to the US District in 2021, will preside over the case instead.

It's not clear why Judge Farbiarz was disqualified from the case, but there are a couple of possibilities. The specific rule mentioned by the filing - Canon 3(C)(1)(d) - says a …

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Will the Apple antitrust case affect your phone’s security?

2024-04-02T07:00:00-04:00

Of all the allegations that the Department of Justice has laid at Apple's door, the most contentious is perhaps its salvo over security and privacy. Apple has warned that if the DOJ gets its way, Apple products - especially the iPhone - will be less secure for users. Meanwhile, the DOJ claims that Apple's much-touted privacy features are pretextual.

The complaint in the DOJ's antitrust lawsuit against Apple says that the company "wraps itself in a cloak of privacy, security, and consumer preferences to justify its anti-competitive behavior." In the press conference announcing the lawsuit, Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter said Appl …

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United States v. Apple is pure nerd rage

2024-03-22T17:33:47-04:00

United States v. Apple is a lawsuit written for the general public, an 88-page press release designed to be read aloud on cable news shows.

A lawsuit is, functionally speaking, a communication between lawyers and a judge. Because it is a specialized missive to a specialized audience, it can become highly technical and jargonistic - this is especially so when it comes to niche areas of law like antitrust or complex sectors of litigation like technology. Tech lawsuits are often obscure even to techies, interspersed with bizarre software terminology that is pretty much meaningless outside of a court of law. (For example, antitrust law loves " …

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How an artificial tooth monopoly put the DOJ’s blockbuster Apple antitrust suit in New Jersey

2024-03-22T16:45:00-04:00

So, what do artificial teeth have to do with the Department of Justice's massive lawsuit against Apple? Well, they may be one of the reasons why the DOJ decided to file its lawsuit in the state of New Jersey - instead of, say, Virginia or Washington, DC, like it did for Google and Microsoft.

The DOJ previously filed - and won - a similar antitrust case against a company that makes fake teeth in the Third Circuit, which includes New Jersey.

In an interview with The Verge, William Kovacic, the former chair of the Federal Trade Commission and a professor at the George Washington University Law School, explains that "the Third Circuit is a jur …

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‘Even stronger’ than imagined: DOJ’s sweeping Apple lawsuit draws expert praise

2024-03-22T16:17:57-04:00

The Department of Justice's antitrust division has come into its own, having filed its third tech monopoly lawsuit in four years.

The accumulated experience shows up in the complaint, according to antitrust experts who spoke with The Verge about the complaint filed Thursday accusing Apple of violating antitrust law. The DOJ describes a sweeping arc of behaviors by Apple, arguing that it adds up to a pattern of illegal monopoly maintenance. Rather than focusing on two or three illegal acts, the complaint alleges that Apple engages in a pattern of behaviors that further entrench consumers into their ecosystem and make it harder to switch, eve …

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Why the DOJ’s case against Apple has everything to do with Microsoft in the ’90s

2024-03-22T10:15:00-04:00

The DOJ says it paved the way for Apple’s rise — now it wants to check the company’s power. | Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge

Inside the US Department of Justice's 88-page antitrust complaint against Apple, there's a cool reminder to the company: you're here because we paved the way.

According to the DOJ, its antitrust case against Microsoft cleared the way for Apple - then teetering on bankruptcy - to launch its breakout success: the iPod. Decades and trillions of dollars later, Apple is in the hot seat. And because time is a flat circle, it's facing an antitrust case built directly on that 1999 case against Microsoft.

To better understand the DOJ's case against Apple, it helps to understand United States v. Microsoft. If you were a teen in the '90s (or maybe no …

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Apple’s antitrust fight begins

2024-03-22T09:10:16-04:00

Over the course of 88 pages of surprisingly readable legalese, the US Department of Justice attempted to make the case that Apple is a problem. Apple, the DOJ alleges in its sweeping antitrust complaint, has systematically crushed innovation in the smartphone world, robbing not only competitors but also iPhone users of the opportunity to get better software and use better hardware.

The argument is complicated, but it has an awful lot in common with another big antitrust trial, one the government won more than two decades ago: US v. Microsoft. That case was about a huge corporation ruthlessly working to neutralize any company that threatened …

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