Italy’s antitrust authorities will scrutinize Apple’s cloud services

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Apple ditched plans for secure iCloud backups after FBI concern
iCloud is one of the cloud services being scrutinized.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

Italy has opened the latest investigation into potential Apple antitrust violations. Announced by the Italian antitrust authority Monday, this investigation will look into Apple’s iCloud cloud computing services.

Similar investigations will be carried out investigating Google parent company Alphabet and Dropbox.

The investigation is supposedly focused on unfair commercial practices. It will also look into possible violations of consumer rights and unfair clauses in contract conditions.

This is the second antitrust investigation announced by Italian authorities to focus on Apple this year. In July, the country began investigating a possible “anti-competitive agreement” over the sale of Apple devices and Beats headphones on Amazon.

Previously, in late 2018, Italy’s antitrust watchdog previously fined Apple $11.4 million for slowing down older iPhones with aging batteries.

Apple is currently facing scrutiny in a number of countries relating to a number of different services. Many of these, including a budding antitrust investigation in the U.S., have focused on the App Store. However, Apple has also faced investigations regarding everything from e-books and Apple Pay to alleged data collection by Siri. Despite the fact that Apple’s not actually a market leader, by market share, in any one area, it seems that very few of Apple’s commercial offerings are currently safe from antitrust scrutiny.

Source: Reuters

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