Tile Writes to EU Accusing Apple of Abuse of Power

[MacRumors]

Bluetooth accessory maker Tile has written to the European Union accusing Apple of abuse of power and of illegally favoring its own products.

According to a report by Financial Times, in a letter sent on Tuesday to the European Commissioner for Competition, the accessory maker said that Apple is making it harder for users to use Tile products on iPhone because it has its own rival Find My app.

In a letter sent to European competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager on Tuesday, California-based tracking app maker Tile argued that Apple was making it more difficult for users to operate its product on their smartphones compared to Apple's own rival application, FindMy, by selectively disabling features that allow for seamless user experience.

Tile asked the EU to investigate Apple's business practices, echoing previous calls made by the accessory maker in the United States. Specifically, Tile complains about changes Apple made to location services in iOS 13, which encourage customers not to use always-on location tracking. In addition, Tile said changing these options involve navigating between "complex settings not easy to find."

The report notes that Apple is also rumored to be launching its own AirTags item tracking tags soon. MacRumors uncovered evidence of AirTags within iOS 13 code last year. The tags will be closely integrated with the new Find My app, which will be getting an "Items" tab. Users will receive a notification when they are separated from a tagged item, and if necessary, they can set an AirTag to start making sounds to help locate the lost item.

In the letter, Tile goes on to claim that its product is being denied "equal placement" on the App Store and that Apple has terminated its agreement to sell Tile products in its retail stores, perhaps with one eye on the upcoming launch of AirTags.

Apple responded to the letter with the following statement:

"We strenuously deny the allegations of uncompetitive behavior that Tile is waging against us. Consistent with the critical path we've been on for over a decade, last year we introduced further privacy protections that safeguard user location data. Tile doesn't like those decisions so instead of arguing the issue on its merits, they've instead decided to launch meritless attacks."

The EU has said it intends to reply to Tile's letter and will launch preliminary investigations following the allegations.

Article Link: Tile Writes to EU Accusing Apple of Abuse of Power

 

[IUBall22]

Maybe use the competition to make a better product. Apple has every right to “favor their own products”.

 

[tomi03]

They steal, and “improve” while macOS Catalina is still a mess, the MacBook Pro is basically trash, and no future improvements at least in quality are near, instead we have new ugly bands.

 

[djcerla]

You have to control the whole widget to have something like Tile working great. It must be implemented at system level.

 

[Appleman3546]

First Spotify, now Tile... the domino's begin to fall

 

[djcerla]

They steal, and “improve” while macOS Catalina is still a mess, the MacBook Pro is basically trash, and no future improvements at least in quality are near, instead we have new ugly bands.

Trash. Yeah.

 

[Apple Knowledge Navigator]

Please correct me, but I’ve never really understood arguments like this. Surely it’s the equivalent of someone buying a Windows PC and saying that there’s a monopoly because they can’t download Final Cut Pro?

 

[cocky jeremy]

Wah! We didn't evolve to make anything better and now Apple is going to take our marketshare, poor us!

 

[tomi03]

I still find comical the way people defend a company that never give a damn for them 🤣🤣.

 

[LuciusMalfoy]

I don't want to be tracked in the first place, and thankfully Apple makes that more difficult. If Tile can't get behind user privacy I don't want any part of them.

 

[MauiPa]

First Spotify, now Tile... the domino's begin to fall

Companies who don’t hire good programmers? Spotify’s complaint was a joke. 2-3 times the paying subscriber base and they complain that someone is hurting their success? Yet they don’t offer great software experiences, because they can’t? Really? Eg cant run their app inside safari, oh until recently. Send sound to iOS in an unusable compressed format which has to be uncompressed and then recompressed? Really? Way to support your users dudes. Finally, can’t even support stereo groups on Mac. Yet we all know that’s possible. Why improve, when you can complain?

tile? So hard to select privacy settings. Maybe hire some programmers who know how to direct customers to appropriate locations (like everyone else)?

 

[PlayUltimate]

as others have said about FB et al. "Don't build your playground in their backyard and then complain when they turn on the sprinklers."

 

[MauiPa]

I still find comical the way people defend a company that never give a damn for them 🤣🤣.

I would never defend tile, I agree with you. Reprehensible

 

[Total Respray]

Wah! We didn't evolve to make anything better and now Apple is going to take our IDEA, poor us!

FTFY

 

[tomi03]

Companies who don’t hire good programmers? Spotify’s complaint was a joke. 2-3 times the paying subscriber base and they complain that someone is hurting their success? Yet they don’t offer great software experiences, because they can’t? Really? Eg cant run their app inside safari, oh until recently. Send sound to iOS in an unusable compressed format which has to be uncompressed and then recompressed? Really? Way to support your users dudes. Finally, can’t even support stereo groups on Mac. Yet we all know that’s possible. Why improve, when you can complain?

tile? So hard to select privacy settings. Maybe hire some programmers who know how to direct customers to appropriate locations (like everyone else)?

Because macOS Catalina, iOS 13, and Apple Music are the best examples about good programming. The irony at it best.

 

[windywalks]

How hard is it to tap on a pop up dialog once the app launches for the first time?
Competition is good, sure, but this complaint should be thrown out with a loud bang.

 

[[AUT] Thomas]

I'm not a fan of Tile, but Apple discouraging permanent location tracking for apps yet doing it themselves and launching a product in competition to Tile most likely using technology that isn't available to third party apps is abuse of market position...

 

[GadgetBen]

If your entire ecosystem relies on another company to function then you can’t complain if that other company changes their objective.

That’s like complaining when your supplier starts selling their own products directly.

 

[mazz0]

Tile said changing these options involve navigating between "complex settings not easy to find."

You used to be able to deep-link direct to certain settings. That means you can include a link in your app which when tapped takes you directly to the appropriate page in Settings. Can you not do that anymore?

 

[deeddawg]

I still find comical the way people defend a company that never give a damn for them 🤣🤣.

Don't confuse disagreeing with Tile's stance as defending Apple.

If Tile can't educate their users to set up their products correctly, that's on them.

Even if the user messes up the initial setup, Settings->Privacy->LocationServices isn't exactly difficult to find.

 

[norbiu]

They steal, and “improve” while macOS Catalina is still a mess, the MacBook Pro is basically trash, and no future improvements at least in quality are near, instead we have new ugly bands.

What are you even doing on these forums?

 

[EmotionalSnow]

They are just throwing **** at the wall and hope that it sticks.

 

[mazz0]

How hard is it to tap on a pop up dialog once the app launches for the first time?
Competition is good, sure, but this complaint should be thrown out with a loud bang.

I think the point is the pop-up no longer offers an "Always Allow" option, so they'd have to use a deep-link to Settings (see my previous question).

 

[Abazigal]

Because macOS Catalina, iOS 13, and Apple Music are the best examples about good programming. The irony at it best.

They are when you look at the Apple ecosystem in its entirety.

Apple Music on its own may seem unspectacular, but what about Apple Music streaming on the Apple Watch and controlled via Siri? Think about the work that goes into not just Apple Music, but also the Apple Watch (and cellular connectivity) to make everything come together.

And it’s ironic that you bring up iOS 13 and Catalina, because it factors into my next few points below.

The number of ways Tile loses out to Apple, off the top of my head.

1) Their hardware / software experience was never great. I used it a couple of years back, and it was just full of bugs. Connectivity problems, severe battery drain, and low install base overall.

2) Tile has a huge ecosystem disadvantage compared to Apple. Apple can do things for free that Tile requires a subscription for. Tile can never run fully backgrounded or have access to iOS at a system level.

3) No matter how many tiles are sold, it will be way less than the number of devices running iOS 13 or macOS Catalina. In countries like Singapore, iPhones are commonplace but tile devices are practically non-existent (based on the last time I used them).

4) Apple has a very compelling privacy and encryption story for “Find my”. They use a key that is unique and changes for every device so even if someone can see all the pings in the real world, it cannot be tied back to a user. It’s very compelling and well-thought-through and it’s something Tile will never be able to match on an engineering level.

Even if Tile somehow gets Apple to capitulate on (2), they still lose out in all the other areas. There is no reason why I would get a Tile over the Airtags (when they do get released), and the reason for this is very simple - Airtags are going to offer a better user experience overall.

And Apple has earned this because of all the work that goes into making their own platform, and I think there is a lot more clever programming and engineering that goes on behind the scenes than people give Apple credit for.

 

[rp2011]

I feel bad for Tile, and Apple has not even announced a competing product lol. But the writing is on the wall. Perhaps Tile could sell itself to Google