Spotify Accuses Apple of Violating Competition Laws by Rejecting App Update

When Apple Music debuted last summer, many fans and critics pitted it against the then-dominant music streaming service Spotify in a bit of healthy competition.

Now, letters sent by Spotify’s legal team claim that Apple is no longer competing fairly and is doing harm to it and other streaming services.

Apple has allegedly been under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission for violations of anti-trust laws since its streaming service’s debut last year. Most of these claims center around a stipulation that if users purchase a non-Apple Music streaming service subscription through the iOS app, Apple contractually receives 30 percent of the fees because the transaction goes through their billing system. Conversely, if users make the same transactions after downloading the same app on the Google Play Store, the purchase can go through the streaming service’s own billing system.

“I can tell you the number one complaint we get from people is finding out they had to pay more through Apple than they could of through us directly,” Rdio CEO Anthony Bay told The Washington Post last year. “But we just aren’t allowed to tell them. Obviously, Apple doesn’t charge itself 30 percent.”