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Apple faces Class-Action Lawsuit over App Store payment policies

The legal challenges facing Apple’s App Store policies continue to mount. A new class-action lawsuit was filed by law firm, Hagens Berman,

The plaintiff in the case is Pure Sweat Basketball Inc., a company that offers an app designed to help users improve their basketball skills. The lawsuit alleges that Apple has penalized developers who wanted to use linked payment methods, by charging a 27% fee on all transactions. The company claims that it would have been able to directly sell subscriptions to its users if Apple had complied with the court’s injunction by allowing “link-out” buttons that direct customers to its website.

Hagens Berman estimates that more than 100,000 app developers have been impacted by Apple’s alleged misconduct, which forced them to accept Apple’s commissions on in-app sales.
Apple reportedly only identified 34 developers who had applied to offer linked-out payments, this number represents a tiny portion of the approximately 136,000 developers operating within the App Store ecosystem.

Last week, Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers issued an injunction which prohibited Apple from charging commissions or otherwise interfering with developers' ability to redirect customers to external payment systems. The judge was also not pleased by the warning screens that Apple displayed when an app tried to take users to a third-party payment portal, and called these as scare tactics.

As 9to5Mac points out, this is not the first time Hagens Berman has taken on Apple; the law firm previously led efforts against the company for anticompetitive practices, resulting in Apple making notable changes to its App Store operations and establishing a Small Developer Assistance Fund. Should the current lawsuit succeed, iOS developers who sold digital products through the App Store after January 16, 2024, may be eligible for reimbursement due to Apple’s alleged non-compliance with the injunction.

In response, Apple has voiced its disagreement with the ruling, and has filed an appeal. The result of this lawsuit and appeal could have significant implications for both developers and consumers.

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