IOS developer who drew attention to App Store scams is now suing Apple

Mobile application developer Kosta Eleftheriou, who publicly denounced Apple earlier this year for negligence over policing iOS scams and app impersonations on the App Store, filed a lawsuit against the California iPhone maker. He is accusing the company of exploiting its monopoly power over iOS applications “to earn billions of dollars in profits at the expense of small application developers and consumers.”

Eleftheriou’s KPAW LLC, which he co-owns with his partner Ashley Eleftheriou, filed a complaint in Santa Clara County on Wednesday. It details the development and release schedule of Eleftheriou’s FlickType keyboard app.

By the time he started accusing Apple of being an accomplice to scams on the App Store earlier last month, Eleftheriou revealed that his FlickType app had been the target of competing software that he says doesn’t work well or doesn’t work, but he still managed these App Store sales and ratings through misleading advertising and the purchase of false reviews. After complaining, he said that Apple did not do enough to combat the scams, although Apple later removed some of the applications that he drew attention to.

Eleftheriou’s complaints join a chorus of growing complaints against Apple and the App Store. Some developers, competing technology companies, regulators and now state legislators have accused the mobile market of being a monopoly in the distribution of software that harms competition and keeps consumers paying higher prices.

Epic Games, creator of Fifteen days, targets Apple and Google with antitrust lawsuits over the removal of the Battle Royale game last summer to use an alternative in-app payment system. Meanwhile, a group of app makers, ranging from Epic to Spotify and Tinder’s parent company Match Group, have started lobbying state legislators to fight the App Store and Google Play Store, with surprising success so far in Arizona and several other bills across the country in progress as well.

In the complaint, Eleftheriou goes into more detail about what he claims to be Apple’s illicit behavior, including alleged misleading advertising, breach of its developer contract and fraud. A notable claim involves Apple’s attempt to acquire FlickType, after which Eleftheriou says it faced “obstacle after obstacle” to sell its software on the App Store. The complaint suggests that Apple chose not to take action on fraudulent and impersonating applications in an effort to force Eleftheriou to sell his application to Apple. “Evidently, Apple thought the Claimant would simply give up and sell his application at a discount,” says the complaint.

At the center of the dispute appears to be the conversations that Eleftheriou had with an Apple executive, Randy Marsden, who led mobile keyboard technology at the company and later held the position of special text entry project manager. Marsden is well known in the technology industry for cofounding the keyboard technology startup Swype and subsequently cofounding the Dryft app, which was acquired by Apple in 2015. The acquisition resulted in Marsden being put in charge of the iOS keyboard on Apple 2014 to 2018.

Eleftheriou said he was approached by Marsden, who expressed interest in Apple acquiring its software to improve typing on the Apple Watch. Still, the negotiations were calm, and Eleftheriou later claims that Apple removed its FlickType keyboard app and refused to approve future versions, as well as a variant of annotations, in what he thinks are suspicious reasons.

Only later did Apple allow both applications after months of appeals and after Eleftheriou allowed countless other application makers to integrate its technology. Those applications that use FlickType technology have been approved without problems, says the complaint. Meanwhile, many other portable and mobile keyboard applications that Eleftheriou characterizes as strokes have also been approved and allowed on the App Store. “By then, Apple’s unfair rejections had already cost Plaintiff more than a year of revenue,” says the complaint.

Eleftheriou’s complaint says that this is evidence that Apple is “flexing its monopoly strength against potential competition”:

Apple attracts software application developers like Plaintiff to develop innovative applications with the promise of a fair and secure App Store to sell them. In fact, Apple systematically flexes its monopoly strength against potential competition through the App Store and profits from rampant fraudulent practices. If Apple cannot buy a desired application from a cheap developer, Apple tries to crush that developer through exploratory fees and selective application of opaque and irrational restrictions against the developer.

At the same time, Apple allows other developers that Apple does not see as real competitors, including fraudulent competitors, to sell similar and inferior products because Apple profits from its sales. Scammers often use screenshots and videos taken from legitimate developer apps and manipulate their ratings. Apple does little to police these practices because it profits from them. Apple then lies to its regulators, saying it must maintain its monopoly power over selling Apple-related apps to protect consumers, when in fact, Apple allows them to be stolen and exploits developers trying to deliver innovation to consumers. consumers.

Eleftheriou says that even after his app became the number 1 paid app on the App Store after being approved, earning $ 130,000 in the first month of launch, he had to face a wave of fraudulent apps and impersonating software that targeted FlickType after its visible success.

“Despite having enormous resources and technological knowledge, Apple intentionally fails to police these fraudsters, costing honest developers millions and perhaps billions, while Apple continues to accumulate huge profits for itself,” the complaint says. “Apple holds its device users and developers hostage. However, each time it faces antitrust claims, Apple justifies its monopoly by claiming that it is necessary to protect its users and developers from unscrupulous conduct and ensure a fair competitive market for the benefit of both. In fact, Apple turns a blind eye to rampant fraud and exploitation to make an easy profit. ”

Eleftheriou is accusing Apple of misleading advertising, unfair competition in violation of the California business and profession code, violation of good faith and fair dealing in relation to the Apple Developer Program License Agreement, fraud and negligence and negligent misrepresentation.

Apple was not immediately available for comment.