A California court ruled Apple violated state competition laws by barring app developers from using alternative in-app payment methods apart from its own, which includes a 30% commission.
The decision may clear the path for cryptocurrency and nonfungible token (NFT) projects to add more functionality to their iOS apps.
The April 24 ruling was made by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in the case of Apple vs Epic Games — the creator of the video game Fortnite.
The court upheld the decision of a lower court from 2021 and said that Apple’s anti-steering provision harmed Epic.
The anti-steering provision is an Apple policy stating that iOS developers cannot communicate out-of-app payment methods through certain mechanisms such as in-app links.
The policy increased the costs of Epic’s subsidiaries’ apps that are still on Apple’s App Store and prevented other app users from becoming would-be Epic Games consumers, the court wrote.
Tim Sweeney, the founder and chief executive of Epic Games, tweeted on April 24 that the ruling “frees iOS developers” by…