Epic Judge Says He'll 'Tear the Barriers Down' on Google's App Store Monopoly (theverge.com) 71
Judge James Donato just made it crystal clear: Google will pay. From a report: Eight months after a federal jury unanimously decided that Google's Android app store is an illegal monopoly in Epic v. Google, Donato held his final hearing on remedies today. While we don't yet know what will happen, he repeatedly shut down any suggestion that Google shouldn't have to open up its store to rival stores, that it'd be too much work or cost too much, or that the proposed remedies go too far.
"We're going to tear the barriers down, it's just the way it's going to happen," said Donato. "The world that exists today is the product of monopolistic conduct. That world is changing." Donato will issue his final ruling in a little over two weeks.
"We're going to tear the barriers down, it's just the way it's going to happen," said Donato. "The world that exists today is the product of monopolistic conduct. That world is changing." Donato will issue his final ruling in a little over two weeks.
What? (Score:2)
I installed the Google App store on my Kindle Fire. It took about three minutes. You can install anything on Android. The barrier is a few minutes of your time and being able to follow simple instructions.
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Because this is a site for nerds, and quite a few nerds work for the company being prosecuted.
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Android allows installing apps without needing to "jailbreak" the device. You can install any app you want from whatever source, and THAT is where the confusion is coming from. A judge claiming that Google is unfair that it has its own store installed by default on a free operating system made by Google? A Kindle has it's own store, Samsung has its own store, Epic can just provide a download for its own store as well, so, where is Google not allowing other stores? Note that Apple requires that app d
Say, that reminds me: What WAS it, anyway? (Score:3)
"Epic judge"?
youuuu
waaant
it alll,
but you can't have it
Re:Say, that reminds me: What WAS it, anyway? (Score:4, Funny)
"Epic judge"?
youuuu
waaant
it alll,
but you can't have it
I will have Faith No More in the legal system.
This doesn't make a lot of sense (Score:4, Informative)
Unlike Apple, there are already competing Android app stores like the Amazon app store in the US. Nothing is really stopping most users from using these, unless their parent or employer locked down the ability to install third-party apps as part of their device policy.
Re: This doesn't make a lot of sense (Score:4, Informative)
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How many app stores are listed in non-google app stores?
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For fucks sake, do you go to Walmart and complain that they don't have a fucking Lowe's inside?
THIS!
From TFA, "In April, Epic revealed it was asking the court to effectively crack the Google Play store wide open — by forcing Google to let rival stores live inside its own Google Play store." Who the fuck thought that was a good idea? Xzibit from Pimp My Ride? "Yo! We hooked you up with an app store _IN_ YOUR APP STORE!"
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The mere existence of other app stores is not enough to say Google is not a monopoly, if those other stores have negligible market presence. Googles monopoly then became illegal when engaged in anticompetitive behavior with their monopoly (monopolies are not inherently illegal unless abused somehow). What *should* happen (and should have happened a decade ago) is Google being split up. But what they'll end up getting is a fairly minor slap on the wrist in a field they only marginally care about as a prop to their real business of ad sales.
Erm... but what barriers have Google put up? How are they limiting competition?
Just being a monopoly does not make you anti-competitive. Just what barriers is this judge trying to "tear down".
The more cynical part of me thinks the only barriers this judge is concerned with is the one between Google's money and his bank account.
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The third party App stores on Android do not have the same permissions as the official Google Play Store, background App updates for example used to be impossible for third parties. The fact that Google puts half a dozens "THIS IS DANGEROUS!!!111" before installing any third party stuff is another big issue. And even ignoring all that, that the Play Store comes free installed gives them an unfair advantage.
Re:This doesn't make a lot of sense (Score:5, Insightful)
As apposed to Apple which doesn't allow ANY unofficial stores or apps to be loaded at ANY level of permissions without jailbreaking the phone.
Re:This doesn't make a lot of sense (Score:4, Insightful)
This is the double standard that I do not understand. Apple won its case against Epic, and was not forced to permit access outside its walled garden, although it keeps getting smacked by the EU for not complying with a similar order to allow third party app stores as well.
Technically, iOS is the one that lacks external options. Both Android and Apple should have the same rules applied.
Re: This doesn't make a lot of sense (Score:2)
"The third party App stores on Android do not have the same permissions as the official Google Play Store, background App updates for example used to be impossible for third parties."
Used to be, yes. In Android 12 that changed. Now app stores can do background updates just like the play store.
Some customers didn't get updated to 12. That's the fault of the manufacturers, not Google. They do it on purpose to drive new sales. Blame them.
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On the other hand, you run into the Dancing Bunnies problem. Some site tells someone to install their own store, or a sleazy app shunts the user to go to this app store, download it, then download their app from that... and the new app store may have zero protection against malicious stuff, maybe even in collision.
This isn't to say that the functionality shouldn't be there, but it should be something a user knows they are doing, nut just clicking on something willy nilly, blindly following a bad app's dire
Re:This doesn't make a lot of sense (Score:5, Interesting)
This isn't to say that the functionality shouldn't be there, but it should be something a user knows they are doing, nut just clicking on something willy nilly, blindly following a bad app's directions.
I agree with you, but... this is a much harder problem than it appears.
I work for Google, on Android security. I often meet with Android device OEMs to talk about what sorts of problems our in-progress security enhancement work might create for them, and what sorts of enhancements they's like to see us work on.
A few years ago, during a meeting with one largish device maker, I was asked "When are you going to fix the Developer Options vulnerability? It's causing problems for a lot of our users." Obviously, I asked for details on the vulnerability... we hadn't heard about any vulnerabilities related to developer options and if it was actually affecting lots of real users it sounded like something that needed to be fixed yesterday (many reported vulnerabilities are interesting, and need fixing, but are largely theoretical).
It turns out that what was happening was that in many public locations in India and China, especially bus stations, malicious actors were setting up free charging stations. But there were some setup steps required, spelled out on a sign above the charging station. The sign directed users to open the Settings app, go to the "About phone" section, scroll down to the "Build number" entry, tap it seven times, then go back to the Settings app, go into the "System" section, tap on "Developer Options", scroll down and find "USB Debugging", enable that, then plug into the charger and wait for the "Allow USB debugging" dialog to pop up, check the "Always allow from this computer" box and then tap "Allow". Then the phone would begin to charge.
Obviously, what the sign directed users to do was to give the charging station shell access to their phone, which it could then use to sideload software. It would then proceed to load their phone up with all sorts of malware while charging. I'm actually not sure that the charging station would refuse to provide juice until after shell access was enabled; I strongly suspect it didn't matter and that users could charge without following the sign's instructions. But users did it anyway.
We in Android security had thought that we had made USB shell access hard enough to set up and with enough clues that this was a dangerous thing to do that users would refuse unless they really knew what they were doing. Apparently, we badly overestimated the users, because lots and lots of them did it.
After I understood what the OEM was asking for, I told them that we didn't see Developer Options as a vulnerability and that we would not be "fixing" it. We spent some time looking into what we could do to make it clearer to users that this was dangerous, and even did some focus group testing of a few options. At the end, we realized that adding more steps or more scary warnings didn't make any difference because the people who were willing to follow all of the existing steps would still do it.
This was quite some years ago, and was one of a few observations that motivated a change in perspective in the Android security team. We no longer trust users to make good security decisions, at all. We assume that if given a choice users will choose the wrong thing, regardless of complexity or warnings. Sometimes we do it anyway, because sometimes there's really no other option. But always, always assume that users will "blindly follow a bad app's directions".
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Nice example. There is really nothing you can do to protect these users, except give them a clear warning, two times for stuff like that. Afterwards, some users will still screw themselves because they have no clue what is going on and what could happen and how reality works. You cannot do anything for these people. They are like the drivers that think they are great drivers, but then go down a road with bad visibility at 2x the maximum allowed speed, while drunk. Some people are just like that.
What _is_ yo
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Yep [youtu.be].
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Yep [youtu.be].
No. It's not that users make the wrong choice out of selfishness or lack of morality, it's that they make the choice that the bad guys have manipulated them into making, the choice that allows their data or their money to be stolen.
We don't expect users to make wrong choices in general, we expect them to make wrong choices when they're being socially-engineered to make wrong choices. So, where possible, it's far better to simply remove the potentially-dangerous options. Though obviously there are often o
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And you just wrote:
Those seem contradictory.
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Hopefully this ruling will lead to Google being forced to change Android's "security model" so that arbitrary apps can be granted root access at the user's discretion, just like on desktop OSes. That's the second, stronger and growing layer of Google's app store protectionism behind the mild inconvenience of adding a 3rd-party app store - these restrictions would eventually choke off 3rd-party MDM options and grant Google a MDM monopoly, which would in turn open up more options for locking out 3rd-party app
Really hoping this is sarcasm (Score:2)
You should read the post by a former Google android security team person above. Basic message. Many users are gullible enough to follow (without insight or suspicion) arbitrarily dangerous (security overriding) instructions from malicious app suppliers.
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The same thing could happen on a desktop OS and yet there are no such restrictions there. Why?
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The same thing could happen on a desktop OS and yet there are no such restrictions there. Why?
Because it is an infringement on basic freedom. Regardless, it is coming soon. Remember Palladium? It is still ongoing even if it has changed its name.
Degrading quality (Score:5, Insightful)
So he wants to help consumers by opening up the store to every scammer with a bogus app. Good job.
Re: Degrading quality (Score:2)
Scammers are consumers too! /sarcasm
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The Invisible Hand of the Free Market IS picking your pocket
It got tired of forcing suppliers to compete for markets and just flipped the script with political donations and indoctrinated judges to forcing consumers to give up their life savings
Re:Degrading quality (Score:4, Insightful)
Worse than that, sounds like the judge is biased and should recuse themselves. Judges should be impartial, and focus on the facts of law. Sounds like the judge has already made a decision a priori.
I don't want to hear "we'll tear these barriers down!" from a judge; I want to hear "we'll determine if the law has been broken and take action accordingly." Court rulings shouldn't be about about "feelings", they should be about evidence.
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Far too often Emotions suffice when facts are lacking
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See also: "Joy!"
Re:Degrading quality (Score:5, Informative)
me, I came here to say, why Google and not Apple? Then read the linked article and discovered that this stems from a ocurt case of Epic vs Google. Epic had a different court case against Apple that they won, concerning in app microtransactions, if I recall correctly.
Re:Degrading quality (Score:4, Informative)
Epic had a different court case against Apple that they won, concerning in app microtransactions, if I recall correctly.
Epic actually lost that case against Apple on all but one count (of the roughly dozen that went to trial). As a result, Epic owes Apple several hundred million dollars for contract violations and the like, and, of note, Apple was ruled to not be in violation of antitrust law (at least on the basis of the arguments made in the case).
The only count that went against Apple was related to IAP, as you mentioned, but the injunction filed by the judge—Apple had 90 days to allow third-party payments within apps distributed through the App Store—was stayed pending appeals, with the Supreme Court refusing to expedite it at Epic's request. Given Apple's response to the DMA in the EU, however, it's likely that even if the injunction goes through, it'd be a Pyrrhic victory for Epic, in that Apple would still demand a ~27% cut of any payments processed outside their systems. Not exactly what Epic was hoping for.
That said, I'd love it if Apple's anti-steering provisions were struck down globally. While I'm generally fine with them shooting themselves in the foot with usurious fees when there are readily available alternatives (as there are today), the notion that they are disallowing people from simply informing customers of alternatives is anathema to anyone who values transparency.
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Absolutely... and actually reading the article, the proposal the judge is thinking about is actually rather sane in my view.
"Instead, heâ(TM)ll order Epic and Google to create a âoetechnical compliance and monitoring committee,â with one representative from Epic, one from Google, and a third they both agree on, to arbitrate the technical details and report back to the court every 90 days or so. "
It's just plain understandable that Google would not want any and everything on the AppStore. Just
Re: Degrading quality (Score:2)
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Except that this was a jury trial, with a list of grievances. The 'decision' was made by a group of peers.
Isn't this just the ruling phase of how the judge intends to enforce the verdict?
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Wait, RTFA? My general sentiment doesn't change though - the sentiment of the judge should be "what is the remedy required by law", not "let's tear 'em down!"
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Oh I think we're in broad agreement; I read the article, it is an unenforceable mess!
'forcing Google to let rival stores live inside its own Google Play store'.
When I sideload the F-Droid app, Google Play has virtually no intervention with anything I install from F-Droid repos and deservedly so as it is an app that is open source and requires a minimum of AOSP APIs to do its work.
If Epic is suggesting it needs access to the proprietary internal APIs of whatever special sauce Google Play uses, well let the
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Re:jury of peers (Score:2)
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This is good for some kinds of law, but law intersects the public interest too, and fidelity to broad principles of healthy markets and limiting control and concentration of power are an area where this kind of thing is distant from "this dude stole stuff from my house".
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I am no J. D.... but stuff like what was mentioned might be grounds for an appeal. Seemingly emotional items like that can cause major issues down the road. Had the judge ruled and stated something like the parent said, about providing proper, lawful relief, that would have a completely different vibe.
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They already lost the trial. We're post priori now, slick. At this point the judge is only considering remedies. Google's "suggestions" that it's too hard to open up the Play Store is exactly what a monopolist who has lost a jury trial on the facts would say. They have no problems with running other Google projects as 'platform as a service' and extending that to the Play Store is not too hard.
And your sig is highly ironic, assuming you're not a Google bot/shill.
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If we face a choice between overbearing store owners (who are also often the platform vendor) enjoying a huge cut of profits and being able to favour their own apps, and some bad apps making their way to consumers, the latter should be preferred. The line between bad app behaviour and the consumer should be redrawn along the lines of what phones let apps do, rather than what apps are permitted.
Did Google not bribe the right people, like Apple? (Score:2, Interesting)
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That is outside of what most people can do. Antitrust law is now about what is possible, but about what is within reach of average (or below average) customer. Most people are no even equipped to understand what an "apk" is.
I searched the comments (Score:2)
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For F-Droid, why hasn't anyone mentioned that??? It is a good google play store alternative
The problem with apps like F-Droid is that everyone who does not even know /. exists is afraid of anything that is not the Google Play Store. Google has told them that everything else is 'hackers!' Same BS that Apple does. The ruling is for the majority of people, who are non-technical.
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F-Droid is also well curated, which gives it a plus overall. I'd say it is a must have, especially if one is using Magisk or similar for a rooted device.
Apple (Score:3)
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Prepare (Score:2)
Prepare yourselves for the baby going right out with the bath water.
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Tear The Barriers Down (Score:2)
- posted from my iPhone
Stop forcing bundling is the answer... (Score:2)
Meaning commoditize results. Then let things live or die based on their value and cost(s). Without choice we're not really in a free market, are we?
I disagree Google should have to carry (list them like other apps) competing stores to make them easy to install, and to do any work in validating/verifying them if they don't want to. As others have said, 3rd party stores can be installed by users if they trust the source already.
Seems less of a monopoly than Apple already, and maybe that's the real target.
WTF is this deranged judge talking about? (Score:2)
Google Play
FDroid
Aurora Store (Google Play, alternative that mostly uses Google Play backend).
Name literally any other phone OS that allows me to do that without rooting my phone? I can side load any app I want. I can root my phone without needing an exploit. I can develop for my phone without needing to pay a developer's license. I can make my app available for free in the official app store.
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Look at what you had to do to get these. Then take a somewhat below average random person. Think they can do that?
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And how did you know you can do that? You are vastly overestimating the average person here.
Epic Sh*tshow (Score:2)
For a judge to editorialize a questionable legal ruling is what's wrong with this country.
Somebody needs to hack his phone and fill it up with malware and crapware because he clearly wants that to happen to everyone else.
People should start keeping notes about how screwed up their devices get so they can file a class action suit against Epic for pushing this.
Huh? (Score:2)