SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A federal court jury has decided that Google’s Android app store has been protected by anticompetitive barriers that have damaged smartphone consumers and software developers, dealing a blow to a major pillar of a technology empire.
A federal court jury on Monday began its deliberations in an antitrust trial focused on whether Google’s efforts to profit from its app store for Android smartphones have been illegally gouging consumers and stifling innovation.
Google lawyer Jonathan Kravis attacked Epic as a self-interested game maker trying to use the courts to save itself money while undermining an ecosystem that has spawned billions of Android smartphones to compete against Apple and its iPhone.
But Kravis repeatedly insisted that more consumers would feel compelled to buy iPhones if the Play Store didn’t provide a safe and trustworthy place to download Android apps.
Epic, though, presented evidence asserting the notion that Google welcomes competition as a pretense, citing the hundreds of billions of dollars it has doled out to companies such as game maker Activision Blizzard to discourage them from opening rival app stores.
Besides making these payments, Bornstein also urged the jury to consider the Google “scare screens” that pop up warning consumers of potential security threats when they try to download Android apps from some of the alternatives to the Play Store.
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