Reported by The Wall Street Journal, the House Judiciary Committee requested that Apple and the other major tech companies involved in its antitrust investigation submit “documents including executive communications and financial statements as well as information about competitors, market share, mergers and key business decisions” by October 14th.
Naturally, Apple’s CEO Tim Cook was named in the official request and it asks the company specifically for executives’ emails regarding the “App Store, including search results, and its decisions regarding the apps it provides to consumers by default.”
Apple has come under fire in the last year over anticompetitive practices that have involved how its App Store algorithm works, pulling third-party Screen Time apps, its split of App Store revenue with developers, and more.
Notably, just week, Apple announced that it has tweaked its App Store algorithm to “handicap” its apps from showing up in search results too much.
In addition to the DOJ’s antitrust investigation, Apple is embroiled in a number of other similar lawsuits including ones filed by customers, developers, South Korea, Europe, Russia, the FTC, and eight different US states.
