If Apple Pay is so much better than what the banks offer (which it probably is), then there's no issue, people will continue demanding and using it. It will force Apple to improve their product over what the banks can do constantly and that's how we customers win.
Currently, I add my bank card to the Apple Wallet, tap my phone/watch on a terminal and payment goes through.
It's not entirely clear to me how this ruling will force Apple to 'improve their product' from a consumer point of view. I'm not even sure what it will achieve, other than perhaps forcing Apple to engineer interoperability with institutions that don't want to accept ApplePay restrictions on privacy or simple UI.
On Android my bank released their own app to process contactless payments. It works well and it's secure by all legal standards required here in EU. Even though Google doesn't support my region, payments work fine. This is an option that I want Apple platform to offer as well. Not that it's an OPTION - Apple Pay is still there and can still be supported and used by whoever. Noone is interfering with that.
More likely your bank won’t work with Apple because they don’t want to pay Apple a cut of the fees.
> Note that it's an OPTION - Apple Pay is still there and can still be supported and used by whoever.
It’s highly likely that if Apple opens up NFC access to bank apps, they’ll stop supporting Apple Pay and force you to use their app, so there won’t be an option.
So now it'll work because they can choose another processor which doesn't demand Apple's fees. That's how free market should work. If Apple provides value, then they'll keep using Apple Pay.
If anything, wouldn't being able to use an app specific to your bank remove one more middleman (Apple, Google, whoever) from the process?
Even if the bank itself doesn't sell data do Visa or Mastercard (or whatever company handles processing?) How about other entities, like retailers? Bank/debit cards can still be used to build a profile, no?
I don't mean to criticize your personal usage policies because I've largely come to accept that we can't avoid all risk of data theft or misuse as long as we're using electronic payment. I just think it's more complicated than "but Google, therefore selling data".
For my part, I try to limit the number of hands in the pot, so to speak. If my bank and the card processor and the seller get info, do I benefit from adding my device's OS maker to the mix? On Android I can choose to use my bank's app rather than Google's service if I want to avoid yet another potential for leaks or profile building.
I look at skipping Apple or Google Pay the way I look at skipping "loyalty cards" which offer some minor discount or convenience in exchange for another hand in the pot.
Oh?
Have you seen the marketshare of the iPhone in Germany?
When 80% of people are using a competitor to your product, it’s hardly a monopoly.
A monopoly is the control or advantage obtained by an entity over the commercial market in a certain area, who uses that advantage (willfully) to fix prices or exclude competitors. Granted, control or advantage of the market is a component, but what really makes a monopoly a monopoly is the intent behind the actions of the entity. If a memo, or meeting minutes were to come out showing that Apple was signing exclusivity agreements, or disabling payment apps on the iPhone (NFC) to specifically put competition out of business, well then that would be monopolistic.
By the way, even when this sort of behavior can skirt the law, it's still unethical. I'm not saying businesses need to actively support their competition, but seeking to put them out of business through backroom deals and price fixing is wrong. It's the antithesis of a free market and unfortunately is rampant in the tech industry.
I think people get confused because the way APIs work on Apple's platforms, effectively open to all subject to you agreeing to their license, that people don't realize there's no obligation for Apple to create APIs for anything. Literally every app or feature could be the result of one-on-one business development agreements.
Every platform has certain technologies it doesn’t allow competitors to access and have exclusive deals.
Should Apple be scrutinized because it harmed potential suppliers for its cameras and screens by making “exclusive deals” with Sony, LG, or Samsung for their respective components?
Apple is not “price fixing”. Price fixing is when competitors get together to “fix prices” not when one company gives another company a good deal to be the “exclusive provider of X”.
You could argue that the market should be "things that can be installed on smartphones" but that ignores that people with iPhones really need things that work on their devices. It's akin to saying that if one company had a monopoly on car tyres, it'd be okay because people could just replace their car and buy a tractor with tractor tyres instead.
Should every website and every web service also have a publicly accessible API? Do you want a government committee to decide when your service or software is interoperable enough before you can release it?
After an item is sold to a user, that item shouldn't be working to undermine the interests of its owner. Those interests include being a market participant for other products to use with it. If giving a user the option to eg change a data source or trust authority would be too much of a mandate for specific development, then manufacturers can just fall back to releasing the basic documentation that would allow straightforward re-implementation.
> Should every website and every web service also have a publicly accessible API?
Sure, why not? Anything a user can do, a program representing the user should be able to do. The alternative is computational disenfranchisement.
So McDonalds has a monopoly on hamburgers sold at McDonalds?
I’m honest not sure if opening up the system would be a net benefit. There are certainly advantages to keeping it closed but we also miss many great opportunities with NFC because of that. I would expect Apple to open it up eventually, when users become used to using Apple Pay and expecting the same convinces from their bank app
I don't trust apple for that more than I trust my bank anyway.
Having worked for many banks, I’d advise you to reconsider that position.
As a customer, if I consider Apple Pay so much more convenient, I'll choose a bank which supports it. So banks are under pressure to either support Apple Pay, or create an equally customer-friendly offer.
If I consider another offer better for me, I will use their App instead of Apple Pay. So Apple can't just enjoy their monopoly, but is under pressure to be the best option for customers.
It’s most certainly not that simple. Anybody who wants to is free to compete with Apple, and many, many companies already do. But this is legislators dictating what 3rd party software Apple must support in its operating systems. Why stop there? Why not force Apple to support 3rd party providers as an alternative to iCloud? Why not mandate a 3rd party App Store? Why should Apple be allowed any control over which operating system or hardware features it exposes to 3rd parties at all? Why should Amazon be allowed to ship a kindle that only supports their book store?
And indeed, why not doing this for other closed ecosystems as well, if this is beneficial for the public?
If public benefit is your only concern, then why don’t you consider the benefit of closed ecosystems, or at least of consumers having the option to choose one? I don’t see any public benefit in removing options for consumers. If open ecosystems offer such a superior benefit to consumers, then surely they would be able to out compete closed ones.
Also, it needs to be balanced with the interests of the companies owning the ecosystem.
So it would be your turn now to argue why this specific law is harmful for the public. (We agree that it is harmful for Apple.)
How is it obvious? One could easily argue that because some hardware manufacturers make shitty drivers, opening up access will allow 3rd party developers to create better drivers, or something like that.
Apple Pay does exactly this. It’s called the Device Account Number.
> Their argument is that forcing them to allow other companies to implement parts of the system could compromise those advantages for consumers.
Why would that ever be the case? The demand is for Apple to extend that secure payment processing to other companies on their locked down platform, not to compromise their payment product.
Can you clarify? As far as I can tell, Apple Pay looks more or less like a regular credit card, and it even has a credit card number that apparently never changes. Plenty of merchant apps will recognize Apple Pay users because they once used it at a different merchant.
Security? The day Apple Pay prompts, on the phone, “authorize $X to merchant Y?” I’ll grant them a meaningful security improvements. Other than that, it’s just a contactless card with biometric authentication.
The credit card account number doesn't change but every time you use it, a new number token is generated and that is what the merchant sees.
The Device Account Number is different for every device, but it is the same for all vendors, unless reset by the issuer.
TechCrunch describes it this way:
> Apple provides a virtual card number and confirmation code (CVV) for the card in the app. You can use this for non-Apple Pay purchases online or over the phone. This number is semi-permanent, meaning that you can keep using it as long as you want.
> But you can hit a button to regenerate the primary account number, providing you with a new credit card number at any time. This is great for situations where you’re forced to tell someone your card number but do not completely trust the recipient.
Competition? If we leave it to the banks we will have a slow, anti-privacy, insecure mess. I deal with banks in the cyber-resilience world, and these institutions do not have a clue.
What market is Apple monopolizing here?
The critics of Apple Pay almost certainly haven’t used it on Mac, or Watch, because it’s pretty darned magical.