Goodbye to iPhones limited to Apple Pay? Europe wants to accept other forms of payment

Apple Pay electronic payment system requires NFC chips (Photo: BBVA)

The European Comissionthe executive arm of the European Union (EU), announced on Monday the preliminary conclusion that the technological giant Manzana abuses its dominant position with its electronic payment service, Apple Pay. The commission noted that the company “restricts competition in the digital wallet market” in its mobile phones, and that this would be illegal under European rules.

Margrethe Vestager, European Commissioner for Competition, said in Brussels that Manzana restricts third parties from accessing essential technology to develop other e-wallet solutions on iPhones.

For this reason, he pointed out, “our preliminary conclusion is that Apple appears to have restricted competition, to the benefit of its own solution, Apple Pay.” This attitude is equivalent to “abuse of a dominant position, which is illegal under our rules”Vestager said.

The knot of controversy

Currently, mobile phone users iPhone or of Apple Watch they can make payments just by approaching these devices to the electronic terminals for reading bank cards, thanks to a specific device, known by its acronym in English as NFC.

on the appliances iPhone, only Apple Pay has access to the NFC chipand a company that wants to develop an application for iPhones that uses NFC has to pay a fee to Manzana. In addition, only banks associated with Apple can benefit from their mobile applications having access to the NFC chip, thus allowing them to make payments.

This investigation began in 2020 due to complaints from European banks that were reluctant to pay this fee to Manzana so that its mobile banking applications work fully on the phones of the digital giant.

For now, Manzana has reacted by alleging that the priority of the payment service is the security of its users and communications between devices.

The company will continue to be in contact with the European Comission “to ensure that European consumers have access to the payment option of their choice in a secure environment”they indicated.

The European Comission He stressed that an investigation like this does not have a defined deadline to be completed. In the event that the firm is found guilty, it will have to modify its practices in order to continue operating in Europe or face fines of up to 10% of its annual sales.

With information from AFP

Source: Elcomercio