By Florence Loeve and Foo Yun Chee
PARIS (Reuters) -Apple was hit with a 150 million euro ($162.4 million) fine by French antitrust regulators on Monday for abusing its dominant position in mobile app advertising on its devices via a privacy control tool.
The fine – the first by any antitrust regulator over Apple’s App Tracking Transparency tool – comes a year after the European Union hit the company with a 1.8 billion euro antitrust fine for thwarting rival music streaming services on its App Store.
The head of the French Competition Authority dismissed worries that the decision would prompt retaliation from U.S. President Donald Trump who has threatened to slap fines on EU countries fining U.S. companies.
“We apply competition law in an apolitical manner,” Benoit Coeure told a press conference.
“But what we have heard … is that they (U.S. authorities) intend to apply antitrust law to the big digital platforms as strictly as their predecessors. So in terms of antitrust, I don’t see any controversy between the United States and Europe on how we apply the law,” he said.
The ATT tool lets iPhone and iPad users decide which apps can track their activity. Digital advertising and mobile gaming companies complained it made it more expensive and difficult for brands to advertise on Apple’s platforms.
“While we are disappointed with today’s decision, the French Competition Authority has not required any specific changes to ATT,” Apple said in a statement.
Coeuré told reporters the regulator had not spelled out how Apple should change its app, but that it was up to the company to make sure it now complied with the ruling.
The compliance process could take some time, he added, because Apple was waiting for rulings on regulators in Germany, Italy, Poland and Romania who are also investigating the ATT tool. The French case, which covered the period 2021 to 2023, was triggered by complaints from several associations for online advertisers, publishers and internet networks accusing Apple of abusing its market power.
“While the objective pursued by ATT is not in itself open to criticism, the way it is implemented is neither necessary nor proportionate to Apple’s stated objective of protecting personal data,” the regulator said in a statement.
It added that the privacy tool “particularly penalized smaller publishers,” as they depend to a large extent on the collection of third-party data to fund their businesses.
Alliance Digitale, the Syndicat des Regies Internet (SRI), the Union des Entreprises de Conseil et d’Achat Média (Udecam) and the Groupement des Éditeurs de Services en Ligne, which had complained to the French watchdog, said the decision was a significant victory for advertisers.
($1 = 0.9239 euros)
(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee, Florence Loeve and Gianluca Lo Nostro; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
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