Apple will provide third-party payment services in the European Economic Area with access to NFC capabilities. Now they can launch their contactless payment services on iPhone. Currently, only Apple itself and its programs can activate NFC on an iPhone. This is reported by The Verge.
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The Apple company believes that this will help dispel the concerns of the main industry regulator, the European Commission, about possible violations of competition rules in force in the region.
The European Commission accused Apple of a monopoly due to a ban on competitors creating analogues of Apple Pay for iPhone.
“We are committed to providing third-party developers in the European Economic Area with a capability that allows their users to make contactless payments via NFC in their iOS apps, bypassing Apple Pay and Apple Wallet,” an Apple spokesperson said.
If Apple doesn’t fulfills its obligations, the company may be punished with a fine of up to 10% of its annual turnover worldwide. The agreement will be valid for 10 years.
EU vs. Apple
In 2020, the European Commission initiated an investigation into Apple. Since then, the regulator has already forced Apple to switch to a USB-C connector in the new iPhones, and by March 2024, the company will be obliged to lift the ban on installing mobile applications from third-party sources.
Also, Apple, under pressure from the EU, promised to implement iMessage supports RCS (modern industry messaging standard). True, the company will still retain the section of message types in iMessage by color, that is, Android users can still be recognized.
Google previously said that the color differentiation of iMessage messages puts pressure on the psyche of American teenagers. The reason was a study by The Wall Street Journal, which claimed that teenagers had turned the application into a symbol of social status.
iMessage highlights text messages from Android users in group chats in green, from owners of Apple equipment in blue. This color designation is only visible to Apple users. The Wall Street Journal, in its study, claims that because of this difference, teenagers who use Android are laughed at.