Internal order from India’s antitrust bureau rejects Apple’s request to withhold an investigation report on the company’s breach of competition law, the order was seen by Reuters.
In August, The Competition Commission of India (CCI) issued a recall of investigation reports from the non-profit antitrust organization after Apple claimed that the organization had revealed the company’s commercial secrets to its competitors during the 2021 case on Match, owner of Tinder dating app. Apple stated that these details should have been redacted.
The CCI requested the watchdog to return the reports and destroy any copies. The commission then releases new reports.
The internal order showed that Apple’s main complaint in November was that the Together We Fight Society (TWFS), an Indian antitrust non-profit organization, did not comply with the regulator’s decree to pledge that the problematic report had been destroyed.
Apple requested the CCI to take action against TWFS for not complying with the order and withhold the revised report, according to the CCI order dated Nov. 13 as seen by Reuters.
The CCI on the other hand, rejected Apple’s request to temporarily halt the investigation due to the regulators deem the request indefensible, said the CCI in the order.
An investigation spearheaded by the CCI found that Apple has been using its dominant position on the app market via the App Store in iOS to exploit app developers, users, and other payment processors.
Apple has denied the allegation and claims that the company is actually a smaller player in India, while also claiming that Google’s Android is the dominant ecosystem.
In the CCI internal order, Apple has also been asked to submit its audited financial statements for fiscal years between 2021 and 2024 under regulatory guidelines to determine any possible monetary penalties for the case.
