EU pushes forward with Apple antitrust investigation despite Trump's criticisms

In the interest of what it calls fairness and stability, the European Union has decided to push forth with anti-trade investigations into companies like Apple, Meta, and X, hoping to reach a conclusion by March.

In January, the EU had initially held off on fining tech giants as it waited to find out the impact of the incoming Trump administration. Now it appears as though the plan is to continue business as usual.

Teresa Ribera, the EU's competition chief, has told Reuters that, while it's open to negotiations with the White House, it will not be bullied into changing laws at the whim of US policymakers.

"We need to stick to our strengths and principles," she said in an interview on Monday. "We need to be flexible but we cannot transact on human rights nor are we going to transact on the unity of Europe, and we are not going to transact on democracy and values."

Trump, for his part, believes that the European Union has too many rules, claiming that the fines imposed on US tech companies by the EU are essentially taxation.

In March 2024, the EU launched mass DMA violation probes against Apple, Google, and Meta. It claimed that it had reason to believe the companies were failing to comply with the laws outlined in the Digital Markets Act (DMA).

Regarding Apple, the EU was concerned that the Cupertino-based tech giant violated laws in three key areas. This included violating anti-steering rules concerning the App Store, third-party browser support, and the new fee structure put in place for third-party app marketplaces.

Apple has made efforts to bring some of these areas into compliance. For instance, in August, Apple simplified the process for EU users to choose alternative apps to Apple's default ones.

Whether or not its efforts will be viewed as sufficient remains to be seen. The year-long investigation is now set to wrap up, with Ribera announcing that the decisions on Apple and Meta will be announced in March.

"There will be decisions along the lines that have been discussed with the companies, developed and based on evidence," she said.

It's worth noting that the EU is also investigating X for separate concerns. The commission is concerned whether or not the platform violates the regions rules regarding illegal content. Ribera says that Musk's role in the Trump administration will not influence the EU's decision.

Before Trump's second term, the EU did not shy away from enforcing the DMA and doling out fines as it saw fit. In March 2024, it fined Apple $2 billion for anticompetitive practice with Apple Music — despite Apple's streaming service being far from dominant.

In 2023, Apple launched the iPhone 15, the first of Apple's iPhones to feature USB-C charging. The change was made to comply with a DMA rule aimed at reducing the number of proprietary chargers on the market.

While Apple appears to have followed EU regulations with practically surgical precision, its rivals have described it as doing so with malicious compliance. Epic Games said Apple's EU concessions were "hot garbage."

Apple, for its part, has maintained that its done enough to comply with DMA law. It hasn't done so quietly, though, as it published a whitepaper detailing the risks of third-party app stores. It then published another whitepaper addressing its concerns regarding the EU's interoperability laws.

Victories against EU regulations have been rare for Apple. However, last November the EU dropped a four-year-long investigation into Apple's treatment of rival audiobook developers after the initial complaint was withdrawn.