Apple reportedly plans to appeal Europe’s inclusion of iMessage as a gatekeeper in the DMA

As many of you may probably know, the European Union has been pushing hard on tech giants in recent years, aiming to regulate their evergrowing power. One such effort by the EU is called the Digital Markets Act (DMA), which aims to combat monopoly and gatekeeping in the tech market. Now, 9to5Mac reports that Apple is working on appealing to the EU about the inclusion of the App Store and iMessage in the DMA.

Apple (not surprisingly) working on an appeal to the EU about the DMA

The EU has claimed that the App Store and iMessage are gatekeeper monology services. The fact that those two fall into that category means Apple will be forced to allow alternatives to In-App Purchases, sideloading, and many other changes to how Apple does things. Apple’s dispute is reportedly focused on the fact that iMessage is not big enough in Europe to be considered a gatekeeper service. The Cupertino giant also wants to debate exactly what part of the App Store will fall under the regulations.

The appeal has not yet been officially filed. The deadline for that is Thursday, November 16. By then, it should be more clear exactly what Apple’s arguments for the appeal will be.

This appeal doesn’t delay the need to follow the rules though, and the deadline for Apple to comply with the DMA is still by March 2024. We’ll probably soon know where this is going, but Apple will not be able to fully escape these new rules. For one, we already know (kind of) that Apple is working on a way to allow side-loading on iPhones. The changes to iMessage are still under wraps (if any are being worked on yet). If iMessage ends up staying under the DMA as a gatekeeper, Apple could be forced to make it compatible with smaller chat apps.