{"id":35773,"date":"2022-05-05T16:53:11","date_gmt":"2022-05-05T20:53:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/?p=35773"},"modified":"2022-05-09T15:47:11","modified_gmt":"2022-05-09T19:47:11","slug":"eu-objects-to-apple-limiting-third-party-access-to-nfc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2022\/05\/05\/eu-objects-to-apple-limiting-third-party-access-to-nfc\/","title":{"rendered":"EU Objects to Apple Limiting Third-Party Access to NFC"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eric Slivka<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

In line with a report late last week<\/a>, the European Commission today officially announced<\/a> that it has issued a Statement of Objections to Apple over its restrictions that prevent third-party services from accessing the NFC capabilities of the iPhone, thereby restricting competition in mobile wallets on iOS.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

European Commission Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager argues that access to NFC is a requirement<\/a> for viable mobile wallet services at brick-and-mortar locations.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

John Gruber<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Apple took a vibrant, perfectly balanced market where NFC payments were used by almost no one<\/a> and turned it into a market where Apple Pay is accepted at most brick and mortar retailers and millions of iPhone users enjoy using it, with whatever credit and debit cards they choose. Let’s get back to a balanced market, right?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

It’s hard to tease out what caused what because access to iPhone’s NFC hardware was tied to the availability of Apple Pay. So we went from Apple blocking<\/em> progress in this area to promoting<\/em> its own (very good) solution. There was never a market where customers could choose among alternatives.<\/p>\n\n

\n

The E.C. complaint wavers between claiming Apple Pay dominates NFC payments on iPhones and dominates the entire industry. The latter was true as recently as October 2017, when Apple Pay accounted for 90 percent of all contactless transactions globally<\/a>, where it was available. As I noted at the time<\/a>, that’s a remarkable achievement for a platform that by all accounts is a distant second to Android in global market share.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

It is, but we also know that—separate from NFC—the App Store generates more than double<\/a> the revenue of the Google Play Store. (Hardware revenue<\/a> is also disproportional.) So how much of the payments difference is because Apple Pay is so good and how much of it relates to iOS and Android customers<\/em> being different?<\/p>\n\n

Nick Heer<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

In Canada, where tapping to pay for stuff has been similarly commonplace for years, people use their cards about twice as often as they use a mobile wallet, according to a 2021 report from Payments Canada<\/a>[…]<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

If mobile wallet apps were so much more amazing to use, should they not have much greater adoption than this? It is ironic that the one clear benefit they provide — security — is cited as a reason against their use.<\/p>\n

This report also found Apple Pay is used more than Samsung Pay only by four percentage points, even though iPhones are about twice as popular<\/a> here as Samsung phones.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

John Gruber<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

I don’t see how the security implications of any of these features — payments, car keys, getting into hotel and dorm rooms — are not obvious.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

I mean, it’s all just ones and zeroes. Apple could<\/em> allow users to add third-party wallet apps and grant them permission to be invoked simply by double-pressing the side button. But what happens then? Do you get an extra step where the user has to choose which wallet to use, Apple Wallet or a third-party one? Or does the third-party one replace Apple Wallet? What happens when you add a second third-party wallet app? It would get confusing very quickly.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

It is not obvious<\/a> to me that this couldn’t be opened up in a secure way. It’s true that things could get more confusing, though the same could be said of many other areas that are (rightly) not locked down today. The question is whether the potential benefits are worth it.<\/p>\n\n

Ben Brody<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Apple told<\/a> the Wall Street Journal it is “setting industry-leading standards for privacy and security” while providing would-be competitors access to the technology on the same terms as it operates. The pushback echoes Apple’s defense<\/a> in other antitrust cases, including those targeting its App Store: The company often insists<\/a> that features that appear to create a closed ecosystem funneling consumers through its products are merely security protections.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

Nick Heer<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Are the security features it has built for Apple Pay unique to the implementation of that service, unable to be reproduced by or for third parties? I am asking honestly. Apple’s statement<\/a> manages to be both misleading — “Apple Pay […] has ensured equal access to NFC” makes no sense — and vague about its security standards. Apple’s security guide<\/a> suggests deep hardware and software integration lends Apple Pay a superlative level of security, but it does not say anything about why this could not be made available to third parties.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

John Gruber<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Is the E.C.’s argument that any third-party app should be able to wake up and respond to an NFC tap?<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

To me it’s clear that the wallet itself belongs as part of the system. It’s the elements inside the wallet that should be open to third-party apps, which is exactly how Apple Wallet works. That NFC card readers in retail point-of-sale terminals only work with credit and debit cards isn’t Apple’s fault or responsibility, and Apple Pay integrates with any and all credit and debit cards that choose to support Apple Wallet.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

So, because Apple makes the phone, they should get a percentage of every credit card transaction that goes through the phone’s NFC chip? And what potential features might we be losing out on? For example, there’s no way to sync my Apple wallet with a non-Apple device.<\/p>\n\n

Update (2022-05-09): Damien Petrilli<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Also because of Apple lockdown, most NFC public transport systems are android only (ex: Paris, Lyon in France)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eric Slivka: In line with a report late last week, the European Commission today officially announced that it has issued a Statement of Objections to Apple over its restrictions that prevent third-party services from accessing the NFC capabilities of the iPhone, thereby restricting competition in mobile wallets on iOS. […] European Commission Executive Vice-President Margrethe […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"apple_news_api_created_at":"2022-05-05T20:53:16Z","apple_news_api_id":"04ee70f0-30d3-457f-9b96-e7bfedf04dce","apple_news_api_modified_at":"2022-05-09T19:47:14Z","apple_news_api_revision":"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAg==","apple_news_api_share_url":"https:\/\/apple.news\/ABO5w8DDTRX-blue_7fBNzg","apple_news_coverimage":0,"apple_news_coverimage_caption":"","apple_news_is_hidden":false,"apple_news_is_paid":false,"apple_news_is_preview":false,"apple_news_is_sponsored":false,"apple_news_maturity_rating":"","apple_news_metadata":"\"\"","apple_news_pullquote":"","apple_news_pullquote_position":"","apple_news_slug":"","apple_news_sections":"\"\"","apple_news_suppress_video_url":false,"apple_news_use_image_component":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[995,1927,31,2078,85,1688,1495],"class_list":["post-35773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology","tag-apple-pay","tag-european-union","tag-ios","tag-ios-15","tag-iphone","tag-near-field-communication-nfc","tag-wallet"],"apple_news_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35773","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35773"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35773\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35815,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35773\/revisions\/35815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}