UK's Competition Authority scolds Apple for its browser policies

13 March 2025
A new investigation will decide whether any legally binding changes should be made.

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Anonymous, 14 Mar 2025Seriously?? On my iPhone, I use Orion browser instead of Sa... moreNobody gives a shit about your Orion, people get iPhone and uses Safari as there is no other browser 99%. They don't know about any other browsers. CMA trying Apple to push freedom and that people would get educated that there are other options not only Safari.

    I sense yet another Apple versus Google battle going on :-). The truth is that both are equally guilty when it comes to abusing their respective dominance's. While initially the consensus might have been that all must run as they want to (google and apple) and there is logic to it as both platforms perform at their best when all is running as it should, later on it became "the" tool to abuse this mindset to force whomever into using solely the "on-board" solutions by making it very hard for others to enter these ecosystems and perform fully as intended by the designers/developers. That's what happens to every company who becomes too big. Greed comes in and all means are good to serve this thirst for cash. For me personally I don't care. While I have used other browsers like Opera and Firefox (very long) I have never been annoyed by any of them but I have also never had a clear preference (I lie, I wanted to avoid Internet Explorer badly as it was extremely crappy). This goes for many other things that are a part of an ecosystem. They all work fine so I'm never tempted to use alternative tools and I'm also not worried about that these giants do with my data (anyway they all abuse your data, even the ones that are shouting out loud that they don't). On the one hand it's good that external entities force these much too powerful entities to create a platform where us, consumers, have all freedom to use whatever is available but on the other hand it's very hypocrite of the very same entities to claim they are doing it to protect us. It's always a question of "personal interest" so don't ever think that instances like the EU government or any other as a matter of fact is acting on your behalf or cares about your rights and security, certainly not when big data means big money (and big tax incomes as a result). In short, don't fight about something that will never change as long as big money is involved. Money is the double sided blade that promotes innovation by giving insensitive to people on the one hand but on the other side it also makes it very hard to innovate truly once big money is involved on the other hand.

      Sorry @VLAD

      This is more about Google than it is about Apple.

      Yes Apple forces it's own KHTML engine to be used for all browsers on their platforms except macOS.

      While Google continues to make it's own browsers innovations that replace industry standards, using it's current dominance to easily.ake them standards. When in fact their innovations in picture and video extensions and tech is no. Better than what was already there - ex webp for pictures on websites which replaces jpg/etc a couple double digits ONLY in some cases difference in picture size makes absolutely NO difference in download speeds in any browser on any device that has modern day internet bandwidth or speeds since 2020! No device or browser would slow down unless multiple applications consuming heavy RAM - limited to 2MB of ram is the max on such a computing device! None has excpet base iPhone back in 2020 ans even them with page file swapping technics to main storage which phones have done an outstanding job on for browsers, never succumbed to issues.

      There are other tech that Google creates, enforces and pushes or forces web admits to implement.

      Google being a monopoly in various areas also takes data from end users for profits without fully notify g users. Changing a picture standard for example leads to certificate issues on other browsers which is turn circumvents end user device security in the easiest way by doing this! Do the research its out there.

      For example read an article that Firefox's main cert expires this friday!

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        • Enigma
        • bCd
        • 16 Mar 2025

        Anonymous, 14 Mar 2025FR. I wish Apple would completely pull out of there instead... moreOh sure, give this man the ancient usb 2.0 lightning cable in his 1000$+ device. It's the port that apple has been using even in all of it's better devices, but oh well.

          Anonymous, 14 Mar 2025Its not about creating options, its about Google paying cor... more🤔

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            • Anonymous
            • 70d
            • 15 Mar 2025

            Anonymous, 14 Mar 2025Seriously?? On my iPhone, I use Orion browser instead of Sa... moreStart reading.

              Anonymous, 14 Mar 2025Its not about creating options, its about Google paying cor... moreThat, I do not know. I just explained what's the usual rationale behind these decisions, and was also responding to the OP's argument that Britain should just create their own technology.

                Anonymous, 14 Mar 2025The UK are not talking only iOS or Android. They are basica... moreexcept mozilla already has a working gecko port to ios that they cant publish on the app store, and unix isnt the holdback here

                  Well world is far behind than just Chrome or Safari its good to have options and choices to not benefit just major players and discourage and dishonor minir players.

                    • ?
                    • Anonymous
                    • CbD
                    • 14 Mar 2025

                    "scolds"...why are competition body toothless?. Just look at contracts, if there is any clause that restricts competition, put a fine from the date of contract multiplied by phones sold. Dont listen to lawyer garbage arguing in a courtroom for years.

                      I am UNABLE even to see videos that work in Firefox on a Mac or an iPad. They are there but load and show in negative, as do everybody's icons/avatars etc on social media.
                      If I use Safari instead (which until this began I never did), everything goes back to normal.
                      Is it Apple or is it my ISP? I ask myself. Chances are it is Apple, but anyway somebody is crippling the useability of Firefox here on Apple machines.
                      And, at this time you cannot get the Bluesky app from the App store, and, if you already have it, it refuses to work on Macs if you do not already have it. Weird or what?

                        I like countries shitting on Apple as much I do like the other guy but its going like this:

                        Apple: breathing
                        UK: shut up

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                          • Anonymous
                          • y26
                          • 14 Mar 2025

                          Altius, 14 Mar 2025It's not about creating British technology, it's ... moreIts not about creating options, its about Google paying corrupt courts to go after their competition.

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                            • Anonymous
                            • y26
                            • 14 Mar 2025

                            Whatevs, 14 Mar 2025"....holding back innovation in the UK..." UK sho... moreFR. I wish Apple would completely pull out of there instead of caving to them. Give me back my lightning cable!

                              Anonymous, 14 Mar 2025The UK are not talking only iOS or Android. They are basica... moreWhere's your source for that? The WebKit-only rule is imposed by Apple in their guidelines [1], in fact, they recently were forced to allow alternate browser engines [2] and Chrome and Firefox are reportedly working on Blink and Gecko based versions for iOS [3]. How do you explain that?

                              [1] https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#software-requirements
                              [2] https://developer.apple.com/support/alternative-browser-engines/
                              [3] https://www.theregister.com/2023/02/07/mozilla_google_apple_webkit/

                                Whatevs, 14 Mar 2025"....holding back innovation in the UK..." UK sho... moreI'm from the UK, I know that every time we do create technology, we can't sell it off fast enough anyway 🤷‍♂️

                                  Anonymous, 14 Mar 2025Seriously?? On my iPhone, I use Orion browser instead of Sa... moreTechnically, every single browser on iOS and iPadOS is WebKit. Even Chrome, Edge, Firefox, etc. uses WebKit on iOS/iPadOS instead of Chromium/Gecko.

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                                    • Anonymous
                                    • YUU
                                    • 14 Mar 2025

                                    OfficialTRider, 14 Mar 2025Lol, in iOS, everything from Chrome to Firefox have to use ... moreThe UK are not talking only iOS or Android. They are basically the whole browser ecosystem be it iOS, Android, Windows etc etc. In iOS you need to use WebKit as the iOS is not Linux based system. iOS is a Unix based system. Hench why the other browser need to use WebKit 🤦🏻‍♂️
                                    Go learn more about operating system before you show your stupidity to the world 🙄🤦🏻‍♂️

                                      Anonymous, 14 Mar 2025Seriously?? On my iPhone, I use Orion browser instead of Sa... more1. Just because you use it doesn't mean everyone does. 93.23% of iOS users use Safari [1].
                                      2. You do not need to lock your OS to prevent other users from using other browsers. All browsers on iOS were forces to use WebKit until recently, after new EU regulations [2]. So real innovation is stifled, and all browsers offered nearly identical performance. Additionally, for over a dozen years, it was impossible to set any other browser as the default one on iOS [3].
                                      3. Consider Google Chrome. Chrome is pre-installed on all Android devices, and the vast majority of users can't be bothered to switch to a new one due to the effort it takes. Due to this, Chrome has a humongous market share in browsers, and Google can easily use this to push for web frameworks that benefit their company and help them make more revenue from ads. Here's an insightful guide: [4]
                                      4. There are actually four active browser engines [5], and this number will increase if monopolies are dismantled and more options are available for people to choose.
                                      5. On a side note, unless you're regularly browsing .onion websites and/or your threat model necessitates it, please don't use Onion Browser. When browsing the clearnet, you *will* lose anonymity so you're better off with a VPN. Also, iOS has full control over some network traffic [6], so you lose anonymity then too. You're also slowing down the TOR network for everyone else.

                                      Sources:
                                      [1] https://techjury.net/blog/web-browser-market-share/
                                      [2] https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/25/24050478/apple-ios-17-4-browser-engines-eu
                                      [3] https://infrequently.org/2022/06/apple-is-not-defending-browser-engine-choice
                                      [4] https://old.reddit.com/r/degoogle/comments/huk4rp/why_you_should_degoogle_intro_degoogling/
                                      [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_browser_engines
                                      [6] https://onionbrowser.com/about

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                                        • Anonymous
                                        • srr
                                        • 14 Mar 2025

                                        They should try iOS instead.

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