Not only American officials are fighting the monopoly of Google and Apple in mobile stores. The South Korean authorities are preparing to adopt a law that will allow developers to use third-party payment systems and not pay a commission for transactions inside applications.
According to Reuters, the initiative of the Koreans may become the first such ban for these companies by a state with a large economy. It is also capable of hitting Google and Apple’s revenues hard. Recall that during the trial in the Epic Games case, it surfaced that 62% of App Store revenue comes from purchases in games.
Note that formally, the so-called “Law against Google” does not say that it is aimed at limiting the power of Google and Apple. If the law is adopted, it will apply to all “owners of mobile stores that occupy a dominant position in the market.”
Nevertheless, these two companies are meant by such storeholders. Apple owns the App Store — the only mobile app store on iOS, and Google controls the Play Store — the largest store on Android. In addition, Google is directly indicated in the unofficial title of the law.
It is expected that today the bill will be considered in the Parliamentary Committee on Legislation and the Judicial System of South Korea. If approved, the final vote on it will take place tomorrow.
Apple and Google have not yet commented on the initiative of the Korean authorities.
Two weeks ago, American senators came up with a similar bill. They proposed to make five key changes to large mobile stores. In particular, to allow developers to use third-party payment systems in applications and talk about discounts on in-game items outside of stores.