Apple and Google’s mobile browser ‘stranglehold’ may face UK investigation | Hacker News Reader

Apple and Google’s mobile browser ‘stranglehold’ may face UK investigation

theguardian.com

132 pointsbeardyw162 comments

It's interesting to hear Apple always talk about the level playing field they've tried to create. From within the company i think they really believe they've got a level playing field.

But then Apple has apps that can do much more than everyone else has access to, in ways that have nothing to do with security or privacy.

- Apps access to NFC (e.g Apple Pay vs you being able to make your own nfc card)

- Inability to have non WKWebView type browsers. Safari can do the one it wants, which is Apples choice.

- Health app has access to nicer push notifications than standard

- Federated Identity type login only works with Apple. So login with Apple is built tightly into the OS, where you can't make an app that does that.

- Wallet app can access 2FA SMS code without having to type it

The list is much longer but it is not a level playing field with regards to the access to apis. If Apple has an app like Messages, other apps should be able to access the same things too.

I pretty much couldn't care less about the app store and review process, but the asymmetric access to APIs really helps Apple cement their moat (e.g with iMessage, Wallet), basically any app where they do it has serious market power.

Access to NFC is a huge one. This has a ton of use-cases in for instance IoT and smart home, and Apple limiting access prevents a lot of innovation in that space which might compete with their offering.

Another example is Apple's privileged access to your wifi credentials. Basically this means if you want to share wifi access via your app, as you might want to do in setting up an IoT device, this is only possible if you enter Apple's expensive MFI program.

So in other words, to have a seamless and competitive IoT hardware setup process, you essentially have to enter an agreement with Apple which involves giving them a percentage of your overall hardware sales revenue on MFI devices.

Are IoT and Smart Home actually *that* huge?

It's a massive example of how Apple inserts themselves as a toll collector on an entire industry which they are largely unrelated to.

Let me pose it to you this way: if you are developing an IoT product, the only way to have a UX competitive with Apple's own offerings is to pay them a toll on every device you sell. In return, you get a couple dozen bytes of data Apple prevents other apps from accessing.

Does that sound like anti-trust regulation is operating as it should?

Bypassing if it is or not, how could we ever know how big it is if Apple is stopping anyone from even trying?

If you delete an Apple app and redownload it it will put itself on the homebar or first app page pushing your other apps away. Comman, they dont let other apps do that!

It was Apple Music and they have fixed that in the most recent update.

Thanks for being a voice of reason rather than assuming Apple Is Evil at every turn lol.

Doesn’t NFC work just fine for most third parties? I have various cards that all work for payment, including a third party credit card (ie. not Apple Pay), mass transit pass, a student card which has payment functionality in addition to key card access to doors. I guess Apple still has final say-so, so an individual can’t create an NFC for her home, or is this possible now? Then again, when it comes to zero-knowledge, do you really want Apple knowing when you open and close your doors? From a privacy perspective this is a double-edged sword.

The browser for me is still an issue. I know the question is more broad, but if Firefox could run natively on iOS, I’d feel substantially better about Apple’s promise to be more privacy-oriented. I don’t expect their platform to have zero telemetry, but it is larger projects like this that speak volumes to me because that indicates they at least entertain the notion of privacy for people who care enough to try to opt out of tracking (versus the many many individuals who are unaware or don’t care).

Doesn’t invalidate your larger point, but 2FA code completion is available to all apps: https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=z0i801mg

You still have to press the autofill at the top of the keyboard with this one.

> Inability to have non WKWebView type browsers. Safari can do the one it wants, which is Apples choice.

This is primarily for privacy and security reasons. One wouldn't want a funny casino app, or the likes of Google or Facebook to hijack people's web access.

Another aspect is the user experience - a piece of web content will render exactly the same way anywhere on the system. There is no need for people to be concerned with webapps asking absurd things like "Download browser X to view this page".

A third aspect is actually very helpful to developers - you can count on 100% of the APIs you intent to use being available on the system's web browser, creating in-app experiences significantly easier (and cheaper) to develop.

> A third aspect is actually very helpful to developers - you can count on 100% of the APIs you intent to use being available on the system's web browser, creating in-app experiences significantly easier (and cheaper) to develop.

This would still be true in the case where external web browsers were allowed - you can still rely on Webkit being available on all phones, but if you need access to APIs not provided by apple you can revert to bundling a different browser engine

Not if the user chooses a different default browser.

I doubt all the Chromium clones would evenly support "normal" iOS integrations, and the ability to (privately) deal with, for example, universal links, App Clips, or even that banner offering a website visitor to use the native app.

I understand the sentiment for wanting to use custom features on desktop, but a phone needs to be much more reliable than this - you can't have something working "sometimes" or for users to have to retry or change settings on the go. Imagine a stressful situation at the airport, and the app you are using needs you to switch browsers or download another app to work...

> or even that banner offering a website visitor to use the native app.

This is something that works just fine for me over on Android, in Firefox mobile. Actually, i assume that the mobile browsers would offer all of these capabilities, assuming apple allows access to, and documents their apis appropriately.

Why is it that we somehow defend apple having proprietary/exclusive Apis that nobody else has as good? It's essentially the same game as it was with internet explorer.

I think if apple just opened up their eco system the other browsers would support these features before long, or app developers would include them in their apps instead of relying on browsers.

It's not like apple is the only one with capable engineers, they just stop everyone else from using their stuff to the fullest

> you can still rely on Webkit being available on all phones

But then... folks will complain that some apps open content in Safari and not their preferred browser.

I work for a product agency, and the ability to rely on Safari has unlocked many possibilities for us. It's significantly easier to create a unique and beautiful experience (web or native) for iOS than it is for Android. This is further facilitated by the consistency and performance of the iPhone platform itself.

> This is primarily for privacy and security reasons

So we don't buy this as an excuse when government use it to justify searching your house without probable cause or silencing dissent.

But when a private company uses same excuse, somehow are we cool with it?

I don’t see how your analogy applies here. If anything you are making my point - by imposing some restrictions on third parties, users are not exposed to random companies sniffing their web browsing habits.

At this time there is but one of the FAANG(M) companies that has no commercial use for user data. This is Apple. You can see this reflected well in their products where we see hardware and software services that prioritise on-device processing + strict regulation for app developers not to abuse user trust.

To clarify what this is about regarding Apple:

After a year long market study, the CMA has concluded that Apple's browser engine ban on iOS in anti-competitive and distort the browser market, as well as limit the capabilities of web apps on iOS and on the entire mobile eco-system. They note that it is obviously to their own benefit, as a weaker web on iOS results in a stronger exclusive and captive native app eco-system, which they can tax at will.

The CMA is now set to start a market investigation reference (MIR) which will give them the power to impose changes to Apple. The number one remedy considered is requiring Apple to stop banning competing engines on iOS.

Announcement for the MIR: https://www.gov.uk/cma-cases/mobile-browsers-and-cloud-gamin...

Final market study report: https://www.gov.uk/cma-cases/mobile-ecosystems-market-study

Music to my ears - from my own experience, safari is a pain to deal with. I've run into many bugs that haven't been fixed for years, and they've lagged behind in implementing standards like WebGL 2.

Hopefully this will force them to invest more resources into safari and webkit

It's actually already happening. Since the CMA started investigating around October last year, Apple has issued more than 70 job listings for WebKit, at least half of which have already been filled.

They also have significantly increased their release cycles, and released a number of bug fixes and new features. They still have a long way to go to fix the huge number of bugs WebKit's been rigged with for years, and to catch up with other engines in terms of functionality, but it's encouraging.

It seems like Apple acknowledged regulation is coming and they can't stop it.

Amazing!

I would hope that this ends with Apple being pressured to make changes. Whether Apple will comply in a way that meets the spirit of the requirement is an entirely different question. I can see them allowing other engines, hamstringing them or otherwise adding friction, and blaming it on “security” reasons.

It is indeed a risk. A risk that the CMA is well aware of though, and among the remedies considered are also present:

- "mandating access to certain functionality for browsers (including supporting web apps)"; - "requiring Apple and Google to provide equal access to functionality through APIs for rival browsers".

All this remedies combined should, in theory at least, prevent Apple from obstructing other browsers.

IMO, at this point, Apple’s resistance to allowing other browser engines is the only viable resistance to a Blink/Chromium monopoly.

Not really since CMA also took aim at Google Chrome's dominance. If that is made no longer the default browser then it'd go a long way to increasing browser diversity. I can only hope Gecko (Firefox) grows in the wake of that.

Chrome is not the default browser on Windows yet massively dominates there with around 9x the usage of Firefox (and around maybe 6x the usage of the Windows default browser, Edge).

Aren't OEMs bundling Chrome as an opportunity to sell extensions installs?

It's highly unlikely that opening up iOS to competing browser engines will result in Chrome taking over. It has always been that way on macOS, and yet Safari is dominant there with around 60% market share.

What is much more likely is that Apple will start investing properly in WebKit to be able to compete with Blink and Gecko. It's in fact already happening.

Do you have a source for that 60% figure? That seems odd to me. Almost every non-techy person I know with a Mac still uses Chrome.

>that Apple's browser engine ban on iOS in anti-competitive and distort the browser market

Isn't this a good thing? Without this distortion, what is preventing the web from becoming fully dependent on the Chrome engine?

Competition from Apple? Why would people use Chrome if Safari is as good or better?

"This website works only in Chrome" or "Please download chrome to continue" might become common occurrence on Safari iOS forcing people to stick to Chrome on iOS

The true culprit of Chrome's dominance, I presume, is Google giving Chrome the only ad ever to appear on the google.com landing page. An ad that has been there for close to a decade.

That is the attitude of a monopolist in one area (search) using its dominance to establish dominance in another area (browsers). That nobody has reamed Google for giving Chrome an ad on the landing page without ever selling that space to anyone else is a big miss.

Advertising is not establishing dominance.

Giving yourself a preferential treatment not available to your competitors due to your control of another market is establishing dominance.

Haven't seen any of those on Android so far, so I don't see why they would appear for iOS. Hell, I've barely even seen websites do that on desktop (Microsoft Teams being a notable problematic web app here) and I'm on Linux+Firefox. The only real exceptions so far have been applications that choose not to support Firefox because of its abysmal market share. It's often easy to find working alternatives for those, though.

The only reason devs would show a "download chrome to use this" prompt would be if Safari were behind in support for the necessary features or if Safari's bugs are too much of a hassle to support (i.e. lack of push notifications, lack of web FS/BT/serial if the web app needs that, or a lack of provisioned browser storage that the mega.nz website relies on).

What I expect to happen, and what the recent expanse of the webkit team suggests is already happening, is that Safari will get better once it gets competitive pressure from Chrome and other browsers.

I've been using Safari privately almost exclusively for 15 years. Most everything works OK, but I keep Chrome around mainly because Unifi web management doesn't work in Safari (it might work now, it's been a while since I tested).

Browser sync and superior ad blocking (obviously not in Chrome but in Brave and Firefox) is a huge one. That's why I use Firefox on iOS.

On Android I can install Firefox, Edge, other versions of these browsers from f-droid, and many other browsers, all with their own engines.

On iPhones, afaik, you can only get Safari, or other browsers that are just a thin wrapper around Safari.

That is a huge difference and I hope they know that.

It's a bit like IE in the 2000s, it was possible to install an alternative browser on Windows but the fact that IE was pre-installed and set as default meant that it was very hard for competitors to get in the market.

This is a similar situation on Android.

Ok, but IE continued to be pre-installed and set as default. Now, it's Edge. It was that IE was set as default AND Microsoft restricted the API for third-party browsers.

Not everywhere, in the EU a ruling forbid Microsoft to do that and when installing Windows, the user was prompted to choose a browser. It was there for quite a while: https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/windows-8-ge...

Ironically, safari mostly only exists because of this restriction. If iOS allowed real browsers, only chrome would have users.

Extremely unlikely: browsers are not banned to use their own engine on macOS, and yet Safari is dominant there with around 60% market share.

The fact that people think that tells a lot about the quality of Safari: "if people could use the real Chrome, they would all ditch Safari right away". That may lead you to wonder why Safari is so bad, considering the infinite funds Apple has? Perhaps is it because Apple has been able to underinvest in it for the last ten years because of the lack of competition?

What percentage of that 60% is because safari is the only browser on IOS? I use safari on Mac because it has all more passwords as 90% of my web browsing is on my phone. With auto generated passwords it forces me to use safari.

You can use 1Password or other password managers. At least 1password works like a charm on both mac and iPhone across browsers just as good as keychain.

Just paid for 1password because of this issue. Still other issues that annoy me like safari issues with my kids online learning sites that I have to put them onto my laptop so they can use Firefox or chrome.

Bitwarden works well also.

I wouldn't be so sure. There are still people who don't want their browser to phone home every bit of data it can get its paws on.

There you go. Even if Apple allowed more browser engines on their devices, you will still see the same Chrome and Safari market dominance once again. It actually changes little to nothing as we already have seen with Android, I would not expect any significant change if Apple did this and it will result in Chrome still being on top then Safari second.

The harsh truth is that you need a properly executed competitor to both iOS and Android. Unfortunately from the open-source and free-software world, there are just too many failures or potentials never being 'realised'.

We saw Firefox OS being cheered all over the place here as an alternative to the mobile device duopoly and it turned out to be a failure due to little to no usage. The same thing with the promising Ubuntu OS and now again we have low usage with the plethora of Linux-based phones. So it seems that the market just does not care, and Mozilla and others are still unable to bring in something viable to compete against the big two.

It is not 'early days' anymore and it may even be almost too late, unless massive amounts of funding gets poured into an alternative. The same thing is happening with smartwatches with Apple again having a 5+ year lead. We've all waited for Mozilla, Servo and others to become useful and they have all underperformed.

Do you want Google web browsers monopoly? Yes, they know that too.

What's wrong with a wrapper around Safari? It's a capable and efficient browser. Firefox can wrap its bookmark sharing and whatever around it (I actually use Firefox on iOS, though I don't bother with the profile sharing). We don't need Safari to be 100% Chrome compatible, right? That's just for lazy programmers and greedy marketeers.

The issue is that the dominant engine developer uses their market position to push their competitors out of the market or to define their own web standards. The former is what happened with IE in the late 1990's. The latter is what is happening with the Blink and V8 engines today.

As for 100% compatibility, most people will regard unexpected results as bugs or hindrances then switch to a compatible browser. You may be willing to deal with those incompatibilities. I may be willing to deal with those incompatibilities. Both of us are in the minority. Even technophiles who normally like playing with technology seem to stick to browsers based upon Chrome's engines (at least when given a choice) simply because too much of their life depends upon the browser.

If Apple were forced to allow Chrome on iOS, Chrome's influence would grow even stronger. So why do you think that's an argument against wrappers around Safari?

Because Safari's not up to snuff and also because Firefox should also be able to compete. If you block browsers based on Chrome's dominance, Chrome effectively already won.

What I predict would happen is that Apple starts investing heavily in WebKit to compete and Firefox would have a compelling offering there like it does on Android.

Most people would stick with Safari because is is the default and they wouldn't even mostly be aware that it now may be worth switching due to say uBlock Origin. Safari would continue to serve them just fine.

If there’s one thing I’m certain of is that given the ability to use it’s own engine Firefox will still lose to Chrome. Willing to bet $100.

It's literally crap and lacks features. See Firefox on Android, compare it to iOS and update your post

That's an absurd statement. I have an Android tablet, and Firefox on that is definitely less agreeable than on iOS. The way it handles tabs, searches, private windows, and data settings, are all inferior on Android. It does have more extensions.

The only thing I need from Firefox on iOS is the ability to sync bookmarks and browser history, while providing some degree of sandboxing from the usual intrusions. What I DON’T need is multiple (versions of) sub-par browser engines, which this effort doesn’t seem to address: give me singletons of Gecko, Blink, and Webkit, each optimized for the platform in question.

Even then, from a technical perspective, I’m not so certain that there’s ANY benefit to the user; I’d rather see some headway made on wasm3 support than to let Brussels or London dictate architectural considerations.

Firefox on Android is ten times more customizable, especially with addons - ads and privacy - iOS/Safari can hide in a hole. Anyway, the issue here seems to be that somw people think browsers on iOS are good, they're not, especially not against their Android versions

A Porsche wrapper around a VW Golf is not a Porsche.

You do have Porsche wrappers around shared Volkswagen platforms though. Such as the Porsche Cayenne and the Volkswagen Touareg, the Porsche Macan and the Audi Q5, or the Porsche Taycan and the Audi étron GT.

Right-it’s probably not the best analogy. It might be better to use the Ford engine analogy (Ford / Jaguar / Rover / BMW et al), where there are multiple brands / chassis using the same powertrain.

I can’t use Firefox plugins on iOS.

What's wrong is that you're stuck with the same shitty browser engine. If you encounter a problem with WebKit, you're screwed.

Think it through.

This article gives a much better summary.

https://www.macrumors.com/2022/06/10/uk-to-target-apple-gami...

It’s not “may face investigation”, it’s the start of the process to force Apple to support third party browsers and web apps.

And this is the press release itself.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/cma-plans-market-investig...

The pdf from the original article doesn't work.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mobile-ecosystems...

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/62a22d5bd3bf7...

This is a comparison about the difficulties (real and perceived) about switching between platforms.

It gives me the impression that Apple goes out of their way to lock users in.

Honestly I'm surprised it's as low as 90%. What's the rest? The Samsung browser?

From my experience using Firefox on Android, very few websites care about compatibility with it.

The Samsung browser is a Chromium wrapper. Some people dismiss wrappers around Safari on iOS, although I think there are more important things to worry about than exactly which rendering engine gets used.

The rendering engine is less important than the JS apis. Safari is missing half of them and some of them are flat out broken.

Firefox on Android ia a bad experience because the rendering engine is different and slight changes have a big effect on complex plages on tiny screens.

lol why did I never have a problem with that when I was on android? People always say FF on android was awful but I just never saw it. When you got them to really talk about it they just didn't like that it didn't look like Chrome and bitter "power users" who were mad at FF for tightening up extension security. I use Apple these days because I got tired of how fiddly Android was.

Safari is not missing anything of value: it's mainly access to USB, Bluetooth and such which have no place in a browser. And Firefox doesn't support many of them either. It's just Google trying to get more data about you.

> USB, Bluetooth [...] have no place in a browser

How about letting users decide to which capabilities they give permission depending on what they need? I don't want to push them to download and install a whole software package locally which has usually access to more data and hardware APIs compared to a webapp that temporarily lives in a browser tab.

> How about letting users decide to which capabilities they give permission depending on what they need?

No. In a war between Users and Developers the users always lose if there is monetary gain to be had.

It isn’t as simple as “hey if you don’t want this permission that’s okay go on ahead !” It’s “we’re going to get this data whether you like it or not”

I rather Strong strict privacy laws before opening the chrome dominance that will come.

Have you tried to use indexdb on Safari?

Apple accidentally opened access to that to the point where any website could read another website's data, that's when I discovered the existence of IndexedDB myself :)

Is that not just iframe and some javascript?

Fullscreen API and web push?

Not really, since this means that if there's a defect in it you have no workaround.

> From my experience using Firefox on Android, very few websites care about compatibility with it.

I get an inferior version of Facebook on mobile Firefox compared to mobile Chrome. What other sites have caused you problems?

It might be Xiaomi and other chinese maker phones coming with a Chromium based default browser

Is there a mobile browser for iOS that supports uBlock Origin?

On my Laptop, I get no YouTube ads. It seems uBlock Origin removes them.

On my iPad, I get YouTube ads in an unbearable frequency.

It seems there is no solution for this?

How is the situation on Android?

Regarding YouTube ads on iPad: App called ‘Vinegar - Tube Cleaner’. Incredible. Best few bucks I’ve ever spent. It replaces the native YouTube player with the standard iOS video player which means you can also do system-wide picture-in-picture from the YouTube website. And I’ve not seen a YouTube ad in videos since I installed the extension.

> It seems there is no solution for this?

Get YouTube Premium?

I would pay for many things on the internet if there was something like digital cash.

But the way it is, every time I pay for something, the mega corporations can tie my identity to everything I do. I am not ok with that. So the barrier to pay for something is very high.

Depending on your level of paranoia, one of these might work.

1. Buy a prepaid reloadable credit/debit card. In the US you can do this at major supermarkets, Walmart, and I think many convenience stores. You can load this by transferring funds from your normal bank account.

Your bank can tie your identity to that, but they don't know what you are using the prepaid card for. The prepaid card company knows what you are using it for but doesn't know who you are. Same with whoever you buy things from with it.

2. Buy a prepaid credit/debit card using cash.

3. Buy a prepaid reloadable credit/debit card using cash. Use this for your internet purchases. To reload it, buy prepaid non-reloadable debit cards using cash and use them to reload the reloadable card. (I'm not sure you can use one card to load another, though. Using credit cards to load prepaid cards is usually forbidden I believe, but I couldn't find anything on using debit cards to do so).

I'm in Europe. You cannot buy+use credit/debit cards without going through an identification process here.

You are watching YouTube. They have your IP, and can tie your identity using that.

Who? And how would they do that?

Unless you are very careful google knows exactly who you are even with multiple layers of ad blockers and VPN. It's built into their browsers and services. They are the best in the world at it barring state agents like FSB and CIA.

I recently discovered a slight mitigation on the iPad re Youtube ads:

If you open a Youtube URL and the preview image looks like it's not the actual video but an ad -- wait. Wait for approximately the length of the ad, and the preview will switch to the actual video's preview (or the next ad, in which case, wait again) and you can then play the video.

(I think this is probably not intended behavior and I hope I'm not getting this "fixed" by posting this here :/)

/edit: I do this is on "Firefox" for iOS, though it probably shouldn't matter.

On iOS, there is a free adguard app that besides general filters for safari (and whole os) let you block youtube ads by integrating into share button(“view with adguard”), I think they put js in there. On android, situation is dare. You have to use dns/vpn blocking or firefox with uorigin and still apps that use webpart can do whatever they want. But of course on android you can get hacked youtube app without ads.

Use Yattee, it blocks ads and improves your privacy.

I have a developer account and just resign their ipas to install it. Looks like you could install it via TestFlight as well.

https://github.com/yattee/yattee

This is awesome! Had no clue this existed.

No but if you turn on strict mode, it gets you 95% there in firefox and brave.

Brave has built in adblocking and I think Firefox Focus does as well. No ads on YouTube.

On Android you can install Firefox and then uBlock Origin as an add-on.

I always want to set Startpage as the default search engine in Safari. But it is impossible unless Apple adds it. Hopefully regulators somehow will make Apple more open in the near future.

Yes, but it is not being ble to add custom options that makes this a total barrier. It's not just Startpage, of course. I have written at length about this [0]. Ironically, Apple is a bigger block on search competition than Google and Microsoft; at least you can add custom options in Chrome and Edge. Still you can certainly argue it is the Apple-Google deal that is a root cause. We don't now what the deal is between Apple-Microsoft (Bing and Bing syndicates) but this may have a big influence too.

[0] https://blog.mojeek.com/2022/05/gatekeepers-of-the-western-w...

It sounds like there might be a backhander in play here that this country suddenly decides there’s no competing in a market which has had the same rules for fifth teen years. Given the ongoing scandals of the current British government then that makes sense that their elected officials area easily bribed and corrupt.

For the foreseeable future the only companies that may foster alternatives to the Apple / Google duopoly are Chinese ones. And there is absolutely no way they will be allowed to gain foldhold in the west.

I've been using Xiaomi phones since forever, they're very popular in Europe.

A Xiaomi phone is a Google phone with full GMS (outside of China).

The Chinese phones telling their masters if you were searching for banned information outside of China wasn’t a great start…

Not really. Firefox and Brave are two great alternatives that suffer due to not being the default browser on most systems, unlike the current duopoly.

Brave’s value-add isn’t the underlying engine (NOT Gecko).

Netscape navigator and IE, or the EU decisions on Microsoft bundling Windows media player? is anything different with this?

An investigation that will lead nowhere seeing as there is no alternative.

This is what happens when the tech press is cheered on for laughing off anyone that dares to compete with iOS and Android.

Yes, I'm still very bitter about the demise of WindowsPhone and PalmOS.

Had they been championed a little more the mobile OS landscape would have been much more vibrant and exciting.

You can't regulate capable competition into existence. PalmOS and Windows Phone/Mobile/10 both died because their parent companies screwed up.

PalmOS was a painfully out of date design by the time it got stuck on phones. No amount of regulation was going to solve the clusterfuck of Palm and PalmSource. Nor was regulation going to make Cobalt actually ship and work as advertised.

Regulation also wasn't going to stop Microsoft from screwing up Windows Mobile. After the iPhone's release the WinMo 6.x development was an obvious dead end for licensees. Android was just a better response to iOS than WinMo. Microsoft then knifed the platform moving to 7 giving licensees even less reason to use it. Regulation wasn't going to make companies license a dead end platform.

An OS landscape isn't vibrant or exciting when established players just stop meaningful development or just have a shit vision. Apple showed the multitouch and a soft keyboard could be practical on a mobile device. Palm and Microsoft were stuck iterating a design from 1995. No regulation was going to fix their lack of imagination.

Nobody's talking about regulation.

And I think you're confusing WindowsPhone for WindowsMobile by the way.

My main issue was that these two OS's Palm and WP had a mountain to climb facing off against iOS and Android and it wasn't helped by the tech press poo-pooing their efforts at every turn, often gleefully so.

I think it's a shame that we will never see a third player in this space.

> My main issue was that these two OS's Palm and WP had a mountain to climb facing off against iOS and Android and it wasn't helped by the tech press poo-pooing their efforts at every turn, often gleefully so.

My point is these platforms were not able competition to even early iOS and Android. The tech press were excited about Android and iOS because they were good and showed how bad those previous systems were. The tech press was also excited that someone (Apple, later Google) actually made a smartphone for consumers. Consumers were stuck with feature phones with little to no Internet connectivity and smart phones were aimed primarily at business users.

At the end of the day the tech press did not control PalmSource or Microsoft. It was up to those companies to make their platforms better and actually compete against iOS and Android. While both might have had the technical talent capable of doing so neither had the vision or leadership and so both failed. The mountain both platforms had to climb was built mostly through mismanagement and hubris.

Don't be disappointed in the tech press or consumers wanting iPhones and Android phones. Be disappointed in Palm/PalmSource, Microsoft, and RIM for not having any vision and throwing away their lead in the space. They were all trying to make bigger and better Exchange clients when a vast majority of people wanted real web access and media functionality.

As a user I have no desire to even try any browser other than Safari in my iPhone. As a developer I have a strong desire to not have to deal with multiple browsers on iOS. Forgive my ignorance but I’ve got no idea what tangible benefit a new browser engine would give. Perhaps I’m just lazy and part of the problem.

Could somebody update URL on this so it points at The Guardian directly rather than bouncing through Google?

Will this set a precedent for car infotainment systems or even TV extra's?

When is a device with a general purpose cpu something that can be upgraded or modified with other software and when isnt it?

2 companies control the actions of 4-10 billion devices and through them the access of billions of people

no car company has that reach. no video game platform has that reach. hence they're not held to the same standard

Well if you want to look at it like that, then the 2 dominant search engines should also be considered because they control the actions of many billions of people, but then every legal system that refers to God is criminal because it perpetuates superstition. Its a case of choose your criminal protectorate.

Compulsory headunit/car separation? That...would be ideal...

We were considering asking for this, but we’re just unsure how important it was and whether it would place an undue burden on manufacturers for more simple devices.

Mobile devices are an obvious target for competition because they are just so ubiquitous and two companies basically control the market.

At least with cars things are different for now; the browser/platform business model is a "surveillance capitalism" one.

Where we (Google or Google via a deal with Apple) give away a product, that has been extremely costly to build, for free, in return for you giving us a (de-facto) exclusive on profiling and data mining your online behaviour, so we can get an effective monopoly on brokering advertisement.

For me it looked like the article is hosted on google.com, but it's actually just a redirect. Updating the URL of the submission would be great as currently it can be misleading.

How does google have a stanglehold on android browser? You can download several other browsers.

Ah, the never-ending quest to define platform features as anti-competitive in order to make Apple worse.

It's not that Apple ships a browser engine that is the problem. It's that they don't allow you to publish apps that use a different browser engine.

Big difference.

I still don't see the problem. Apple is a minority player in this market. Android presumably allows whatever you want, right? If you want the customized experience, use that.

> Apple is a minority player in this market.

In the phone market?

Maybe by units. Certainly not by revenue. Either way, they have a monopoly on "iPhone apps" and their distribution. You can argue whether that's a market in itself. But lawyers and regulators can make an argument too.

Revenue does not determine market control. Market share does. They are DEFINITELY a minority player vs. Android in terms of handsets in use. It’s not close.

Closed platforms have always been a thing. Mostly, they’ve been game consoles. It is hard to understand how Apple should be forced to do anything on antitrust or monopoly grounds, though, based how we have traditionally understood anticompetitive practices.

Using google’s domain for this subscription is particularly funny

What are you going to do about it? A symbolic fine? There are no alternatives.

The obvious one would be to fine Apple until they implement Android-style mechanisms for openness. As pointed out above, although they're being lumped together, Android is leagues more open than iOS. Does it even make sense to talk about an Android "stranglehold" when the OS is forkable and many vendors have their own spins on it, with new features often appearing there first before Google even have it themselves?

In reality they are going to be treated together, because governments tend to reason in terms of countries and people not technical details. Apple/Android are both rich US tech firms who aren't going to leave the market regardless of how big the fines get, and in Android's case literally can't (because someone else could simply license it or use it and step in to replace Google). So it'll be like all other attempts at tech regulation, it'll just turn into cranking the handle on the cash cow to try and fill a part of the lockdown-created budget holes.

> Does it even make sense to talk about an Android "stranglehold" when the OS is forkable and many vendors have their own spins on it,

There are improvements to be had here.

> The agreement (to pre-install Google play) places a company-wide ban on Android forks, saying OEMs are forbidden from taking "any actions that may cause or result in the fragmentation of Android"

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/02/new-android-oem-lice...

For better or for worse this restriction limits the ability for an Android fork to get off the ground.

Requiring them to stop banning competing browser engines? That's the number one remedy considered by the CMA.

You should read the study, it's very insightful.

Apple has budget to the requirement for allowing alternative payment methods in dating apps for the Dutch market following a lawsuit and racking up a noncompliance fine they'll now need to pay anyway.

These regulatory bodies can and often do have an effect on large corporations if the punishment for ignoring them is set high enough.

Progressively larger fines?

fill their pockets and then shut up for a few years

Direct link: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jun/10/apple-and-g...

There is some irony with this submission URL being redirected through Google, with who knows what amount of tracking. Probably because they ended up copy-pasting something that looks like a URL at first, but when you click on it, changes to be a redirect through Google (looking at you, Google search results).

Embarrassed! Though in mitigation I use the Guardian app so I wanted a clean link. Failed.

Can you edit it?

If not, @dang, can you please edit it?

No, just the title.

Waste of tax payers money

I am struggling to get my arms round this

I mean, it's not actually about the browser, but let's ignore that.

Companies that sell phones choose to install a particular OS. Apple's choice is obvious, for others (99.9%) it's a version of Android. The vast majority of those choose to use Google's ecosystem with its Playstore.

Much as I can understand the sentiment, I can't see how it equates to a stranglehold. If others want to create a new OS and get manufacturers to install it they can.

Whether the UK has any clout compared to the EU is a different question.

On iOS, it is about the browser, as Apple is acting anti-competitive by not allowing any other browser engines but their own. Browser makers can't compete with Safari by making a faster browser for example, because they won't be able to deploy it on iOS device. All applications go through the App Store, and the App Store forbids any browser engines not made by Apple.

Regarding the app stores, it seems like lawmakers are catching up with the idea of "If I buy it, I should be able to own it and make my own decisions", which includes being able to install applications from 3rd party developers. It seems like a fine idea that Apple has a default application index where you can install applications from, but what is not fine is Apple deciding which application indexes should be allowed to exists in the first place.

Kind of like how lawmakers wouldn't look the other way if suddenly all macOS computers only allowed installation of software from the App Store. Purchasing a device shouldn't mean "The company decides what I'm allowed to install on this thing".

There is one key requirement of a mobile phone that doesn’t apply to a desktop scenario: the device MUST adhere to carrier-specific requirements, some of which may block access to telephony-associated hardware, or require that a manufacturer be able to provide a minimum standard of performance. Do you see AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile or other carriers complaining about having only one browser engine per device?

Do you see them requiring only one browser engine on all of the Android devices they sell? No.

The requirements of carriers are orthogonal to browser choice post-sale.

Does that include consoles and smart TVs?

If definitely should in my opinion, though legislation seems to fall behind there because the tight grip on hardware has been there for decades now.

Although, I don't see any technical reason why Google wouldn't be able to put Chrome on Xbox and PlayStation. Nintendo is very browser averse (probably because every time they stick a browser in something it's full of holes and leads to jailbreaks).

Hopefully, the Steam Deck will open people's eyes at what could be. So far its sales don't seem to be dropping off.

If they get to the point of hurting competition, why not?

Hurting competition? Console manufacturers have had stricter requirements and more onerous developer restrictions than any mobile platform since the 80s.

That's not the same as hurting competition though. Are there games that consumers are playing on mobile platforms that aren't allowed on consoles?

The approval process and the dev kit requirements for console games have always been a nightmare for third party game studios compared to just buying a $599 Mac Mini and $99/year to get into the developer program.

Sounds like they’re overdue for oversight, then.

Competition authorities now look at situations that end up uncompetitive, so in this case there is (perhaps implicit, or they are looking for) evidence that its not easy to launch a new phone platform and OS because of the behaviour of the existing platforms. I think the question they need to answer is whether its due to the behaviour of the uncumbents, or that the cost of making a competitive OS (with maps etc) is very high. You could also argue that Android is "price dumping" as it is cross subsidised via the ad business (as is iOS too as Google pays billions) which makes it more complex from the competition point of view.

At this point, the EU regulatory bodies are probably inclined to agree with their former brethren. There seem to be very few national or supranational governments left that are going to bat for these companies.

> If others want to create a new OS and get manufacturers to install it they can.

That is always true for any monopoly. Any company could create their own phone system and compete with AT&T. That was never in doubt. The problem is that it is not happening, there is no competition, and when there is, some FAANG buys it.

Capitalism does not work without competition. Economies of scale and the network effect makes it really difficult to compete. Or governments do something, or stagnation and centralised control take over.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com