In a recent ruling, US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers found that Apple had wilfully violated her 2021 injunction in a case brought by Epic Games. The injunction aimed to prevent Apple from engaging in anticompetitive conduct and pricing, allowing for outside payment options on the App Store. Judge Gonzalez Rogers expressed concern over Apple’s noncompliance and referred the matter to the US Attorney for Northern District of California for potential criminal contempt proceedings. Apple responded to the ruling, stating they would comply with the court’s order and appeal the decision. The case, which involved Epic Games, the maker of Fortnite, challenged Apple’s 15-30% commission on in-app purchases and argued that the App Store was monopolistic. In her 2021 judgement, Judge Gonzalez Rogers ruled that Apple could no longer prohibit developers from linking to their own purchasing mechanisms. This ruling would enable movie-streaming services, for example, to direct customers to subscribe via their own websites instead of using Apple’s in-app purchasing mechanism. In a contempt order issued on Wednesday, Judge Gonzalez Rogers found that Apple had continued to interfere with competition, stating that such actions would not be tolerated. Internal company documents reviewed by the judge revealed that Apple had deliberately violated the injunction. She wrote that CEO Tim Cook ignored advice from executive Phillip Schiller to comply with the injunction and instead allowed CFO Luca Maestri to persuade him otherwise. The judge also accused Apple’s vice president of finance, Alex Roman, of lying under oath. Apple’s attempts to evade the injunction included charging a 27% commission on off-app purchases, where previously there had been no charge. The company also imposed new barriers and requirements to discourage customers from using competing purchasing platforms. In response, Epic Games founder and CEO Tim Sweeney announced that Fortnite would be returning to the US iOS App Store next week and extended an olive branch to Apple. Sweeney proposed that if Apple extended the court’s “friction-free, Apple-tax-free” framework worldwide, Epic would return Fortnite to the App Store globally and drop all related litigation. Sweeney also declared that there would be “NO FEES on web transactions” and that Apple’s “15-30% junk fees” were now “dead” in the United States, as they are in Europe under the Digital Markets Act. By BBC News Email your news TIPS to Editor@Kahawatungu.com — this is our only official communication channel.