Apple Inc. has paid a fine of 906 million rubles (currently about RMB 82.99 million) in a Russian antitrust case involving Apple’s alleged abuse of its dominant position in the mobile app market, the Russian news agency reported Monday, citing sources.
In April 2021, the Russian Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) announced an antitrust fine of 906 million rubles against Apple, which the FAS claimed at the time had abused its dominant position in the app distribution market in two cases: by creating barriers to developers of parental control apps and by not having clear rules for approving apps in the app store. In response, Apple subsequently filed an appeal. Last Wednesday, the Moscow Arbitration Court rejected this appeal by Apple.
The investigation was reportedly conducted at the request of the Russian cybersecurity company Kaspersky Lab. Kaspersky Lab said that they had submitted the parental control application Kaspersky Safe Kids to Apple, which was rejected by Apple without reason. But then Apple introduced a similar feature, Screen Time, to its iOS 12 mobile operating system.
Last month Apple asked the Moscow Arbitration Court to invalidate a ruling by the Russian Antimonopoly Service (FAS) that fined the company 1.2 billion rubles for tying Apple’s payment system to the Russian developer’s app. To the published court decision, Apple’s application was submitted to the court on January 31, with a preliminary hearing scheduled for March 13. on January 17, the Russian Antimonopoly Service reported that it had fined Apple for abuse of a dominant position.
