Apple moves to cut Beeper, the app that brought iMessage to Android users, It has already caught the attention of US Senator Elizabeth Warren Which called out the tech giant for anti-competitive behavior. Now, a bipartisan group of US lawmakers is calling on the US Department of Justice to investigate “potentially anticompetitive treatment by Apple of the messaging app Paper Mini,” noting that “interoperability and interconnectedness have long been key drivers of competition and consumer choice in services.” Telecommunications. “
The letter is addressed to Assistant U.S. Attorney Kanter and signed by Senator Amy Klobuchar, Senator Mike Lee, Representative Jerry Nadler, and Representative Ken Buck. In it, they noted that the Commerce Department had earlier this year described Apple as a “gatekeeper” with a “monopoly position” in its mobile app ecosystem. They also pointed to Beeper’s CEO Eric MigicowskiTestifying in December 2015 before the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Competition Policy, Antitrust, and Consumer Rights, where he expressed concern that “dominant messaging services would use their position to impose barriers to interoperability” and would prevent Beeper from operating.
“Given Apple’s recent actions, this concern is clear,” the letter said. Given the anti-competitive nature of Apple’s actions, lawmakers referred this matter to the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division for further investigation.
The letter is the latest in a series of battles between the startup Beeper and Apple.
Earlier this month, Whistle It debuted an app called Beeper Mini, which took advantage of new technology to bring support for blue-bubble iMessage conversations to Android users. The startup’s older app, an aggregator of multiple messaging services, was then renamed Beeper Cloud while development of Beeper Mini progressed with the goal of eventually switching all users to the newer app.
Initially, Beeper charged users $1.99 per month to access Beeper Mini, but later dropped the price to free as Apple began cutting off Beeper’s ability to deliver messages reliably. Although the company was able to roll out the fix, Apple once again targeted Beeper users, intentionally blocking messages for about 5% of users, the company said.
Apple claimed that Pepper’s technologies “pose significant risks to user security and privacy, including the potential for revealing metadata and enabling spam, spam, and phishing attacks,” which is why it has taken “steps to protect” its users.
Pepper Founder and CEO, Eric MigicowskiHe, who previously founded the Pebble smartwatch, challenged Apple to agree to an independent, third-party security audit of the Beeper app, so he could prove that the app maintains end-to-end encryption, as Beeper promised. Apple has not yet accepted this offer.
The Beeper Mini app currently works by allowing users to authenticate with their Apple ID and will remain free until further notice, due to possible Apple intervention.
“A very strong signal from lawmakers from both parties in the House and Senate. “There’s a lot coming this week.” Migicowski said in a post on X About the message, it was first reported by CBS Morning In a clip about the Beeper app.