Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service opens case against Apple for failing to preinstall Max, RuStore on iOS devices

MOSCOW. Aug 3 (Interfax) - The Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) has opened a case against the U.S. corporation Apple for failing to preinstall the Russian app store RuStore and the Russian messaging app Max on its iPhone and iPad, the regulator said in a statement on Monday.

"The company did not comply with the FAS warning to preinstall the national messaging app and the national app store on its iOS devices (iPhone, iPad). The FAS opened a case against the company in accordance with the competition law and the already established law-enforcement practice in regard to Apple," the statement said.

In early July, Apple was issued a FAS warning that it had until July 15 to eliminate discriminatory conditions for Russian search engines and to comply with the requirement to preinstall Russian software on iOS devices in relation to the default installation of a foreign search engine on iPhone and iPad, forcing users to change it manually. Another reason cited by the FAS at the time was a failure to comply with the laws requiring the pre-installation of Max and RuStore.

Apple said it had enabled the pre-installation of a Russian search engine in an updated OS version from July 27, without complying with the Max and RuStore warning.

In June Max and a whole host of VK applications were deleted from the App Store. This prompted Russia's Digital Development Ministry to ask the FAS to check Apple on the subject of complying with Russian antitrust laws that require technically sophisticated goods available in Russia to allow working with a search engine made in Russia or another member state of the Eurasian Economic Union.

Once the case has been considered, and if found in breach of the competition law Apple will face a fine in accordance with the Russian Code of Administrative Offenses, the FAS said. The fine could be up to 4 billion rubles, the FAS said at the time of issuing the warning.

Max and VK have been under European Union sanctions since the middle of July, their applications have also been deleted from Google Play.