Shortly after Jonathan Kanter took over the Justice Department’s antitrust division in November 2021, the agency secured another $50 million to investigate monopolies, break up criminal cartels and block mergers.

To celebrate, Mr. Kanter bought a prop of a giant check, placed it outside his office and wrote on the memo line of the check: “Break ‘Em Up.”

Mr. Kanter, 50, has promoted that philosophy ever since, becoming a leading architect of the most significant effort in decades to combat the concentration of power in corporate America. He made his biggest blow Thursday when the Justice Department filed an antitrust lawsuit against Apple. In the 88-page lawsuit, the government argued that Apple violated antitrust laws with practices designed to keep customers dependent on their iPhones and less likely to switch to competing devices.

This lawsuit joins two antitrust lawsuits brought by the Department of Justice against Google, alleging that the company illegally strengthened monopolies. Mr. Kanter’s staff has also challenged numerous corporate mergers, including a lawsuit to stop JetBlue Airways from acquiring Spirit Airlines.

“We want to help real people by making sure our antitrust laws work for workers, work for consumers, work for entrepreneurs and work to protect our democratic values,” Kanter said in an interview in January. He declined to comment on the Google cases and other active lawsuits.

At one news conference on the Apple lawsuit on Thursday, Mr. Kanter compared the action to previous Justice Department challenges to Standard Oil, AT&T and Microsoft. The lawsuit is aimed at protecting “the market for the innovations that we cannot yet observe,” he said.

Mr. Kanter and Lina Khan, the chair of the Federal Trade Commission, have now taken action against four of the six largest public technology companies in a sweeping effort to rein in the industry’s power. The FTC has separately filed antitrust cases against Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, and Amazon.

But Mr. Kanter and Ms. Khan are busy seeing how far they can go with their efforts. The November election could remove President Biden from the White House and take Mr. Kanter and Ms. Khan with him.

More than two dozen people who know Kanter, including current and former Justice Department employees, described his rise over the past two decades. Some spoke anonymously to describe confidential government deliberations and presentations.

Mr. Kanter grew up in the apartment in Queens, New York, where his parents still live. After graduating from Forest Hills High School, he attended the State University of New York at Albany and then law school at Washington University in St. Louis.

“I grew up in a neighborhood with teachers and police officers and taxi drivers and shopkeepers and people who worked very hard,” he said, and did so with the “belief that the American dream really provided openings and opportunities to create a better life for people.” to realise’. future generations.”

He said he tied antitrust enforcement to these values ​​because “it’s about making sure these opportunities are available to everyone and making sure people can succeed on their own.”

After obtaining his law degree, Mr. Kanter worked at the FTC before joining major law firms such as Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft and Paul Weiss. At one point he represented Microsoft. As the company launched an offensive against Google, which had eaten its lunch in online search, Mr. Kanter made clear in Washington that Google deserved additional scrutiny.

He later made similar arguments to other Google critics such as News Corp and Yelp, saying regulators should also investigate other tech giants. At the same time, he defended corporate mergers in individual sectors.

Kanter’s work against a number of tech giants won him fans among those who believed antitrust laws were an essential tool for making the economy fairer.

“Here was an insider who had also come to very similar conclusions,” Ms. Khan said in an interview in November.

After his nomination was confirmed by Mr. Biden, Mr. Kanter, who often favors formal peak lapels and once a photo shoot an A. Lange & Söhne dress watch that retails for $34,500, presented his plan for the antitrust division to staff, people with knowledge of the presentation said.

Mr Kanter described his initiatives with catchy code names. A plan for the agency to quickly intervene in active lawsuits earned the Gen Z nickname “Real Time AF,” short for real-time antitrust filings. He called a plan to investigate senior business leaders the “Billionaire Accountability Project.”

Mr. Kanter told his team that he wanted the department to be able to handle 30 civil lawsuits and another 30 criminal cases at any given time. He called the plan ’30 for 30′.

The agency was already stretched thin and some on staff felt Mr. Kanter was setting unreasonable goals, people with knowledge of the matter said.

His time in private practice also cast a shadow. Mr. Kanter did not initially work on lawsuits against Google because he had spent years representing his rivals. When he can’t work on cases, including the challenge to JetBlue’s purchase of Spirit, they are led by his chief deputy, Doha Mekki.

Still, Mr. Kanter has been proactive in the lawsuits against the tech giants.

When a Google antitrust lawsuit over online search went to trial last year, he told government lawyers to be more explicit and prominent in their argument that the sheer size of the company’s operations entrenched the company’s power and left it ahead of its rivals made it harder to compete. knowledgeable said. That idea was a central theme when the case went to trial in a Washington courtroom last fall. (A ruling is expected later this year.)

Mr. Kanter also oversaw the final months of the Justice Department’s investigation into Google’s control of online advertising technology. He argued to colleagues that the government should insist that the lawsuit be decided by a jury rather than a judge, which is the norm in similar civil cases, a person familiar with the matter said. A jury trial will take place in September.

Mr. Kanter’s work has come under scrutiny from critics who question whether he and his compatriots are pushing the limits of antitrust law too far, hurting the economy.

William Kovacic, a law professor at George Washington University and former chairman of the FTC, said Kanter had not yet won the kind of sweeping monopoly lawsuit the organization pursued against Apple and Google.

“In some ways he’s still looking for that more prominent trophy for the mantelpiece,” he said. “If you win one of these monopolization cases, you can take the rest of the decade off.”

In the January interview, Mr. Kanter defended his commitment to changing the way the agency does business. He said the world has changed radically in the past thirty years. People communicate through new media, get their information from different sources and do business on emerging platforms.

“It is important that if we want antitrust enforcement that is fit for purpose in a modern economy, we recognize these changes,” he said. “And then we adapt to ensure that we uphold the letter of the antitrust law and the applicable precedents. But we enforce the law in a way that reflects the realities of today’s economy.”

Tripp Mickle contributed reporting from San Francisco. Jack Beg research contributed.

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This week, the US Department of Justice sued Apple because the company has a monopoly on the smartphone market. We dissect the lawsuit and wonder if this will be a major turning point in Apple’s dominance. Then, Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist, argues that smartphones and social media are to blame for the widespread increase in mental health problems among young people. He tells us his four possible solutions to the problem. And finally, Reddit’s market cap was $9.2 billion when it debuted on the New York Stock Exchange this week, but the company is still not making any money. We talk about the challenges Reddit faces as it goes public, and how the site may change as a result.

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Credits

“Hard Fork” is hosted by Kevin Rose And Casey Newton and produced by Davisland And Rachel Cohn. The show is edited by Jen Poyant. Technology through Chris Wood and original music by Then Powell, Marion Lozano And Rowan Niemisto Fact check through Caitlin Love.

Special thanks to Paula Szuchman, Pui-Wing Tam, Nell Gallogly, Kate LoPresti And Jeffery Miranda.

The US accused Apple of a monopoly

The Department of Justice has filed an antitrust lawsuit against tech giant Apple. The lawsuit – which includes 16 states and the District of Columbia – is the federal government’s biggest challenge to Apple’s reach and influence.

The government argued that Apple violated antitrust laws with practices designed to keep customers dependent on their iPhones and less likely to switch to a competing device. By tightly controlling the user experience on iPhones and other devices, Apple has created an uneven playing field, where critics grant its own products and services access to core features that competitors are denied.

It argued that the tech giant was preventing other companies from offering applications that compete with Apple products such as its digital wallet – which could reduce the value of the iPhone. It also said Apple’s policies hurt consumers and smaller businesses that compete with its services, and said its practices resulted in “higher prices and less innovation.”

Reply: Apple has said its control over technology makes iPhones more secure than other smartphones.

What’s next: It is unclear what consequences the lawsuit – which will likely drag on for years – would have for consumers.

Details: The lawsuit asks the court to restrain Apple from engaging in practices such as blocking cloud streaming apps and undermining messaging on smartphone operating systems.

Go deeper: Here’s the lawsuit.

The Indian opposition is facing problems

Just weeks before a crucial election, the head of one of India’s leading opposition parties, the Aam Aadmi Party, was arrested yesterday on what his supporters said were fraudulent charges. That same day, the Indian National Congress – the main opposition party – said it had lost access to most of its major bank accounts.

Critics said the measures were aimed at disadvantaging Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rivals. As the vote approaches, opposition figures say they are facing a wave of problems from the government, including Modi’s unleashing of major investigative agencies against them while protecting those who switch to his side.

To vote: It lasts six weeks and starts on April 19.

The Dodgers fired Ohtani’s interpreter

The Los Angeles Dodgers fired Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter after the baseball star’s representatives accused the employee, Ippei Mizuhara, of using Ohtani’s money to place bets with a bookmaker under federal investigation.

Details are murky. Ohtani’s representatives called him a “victim of a massive theft,” and a Major League Baseball official said Ohtani, a Japanese slugger, currently faces no disciplinary action.

Background: Ohtani and Mizuhara were closer than most players and their interpreters. For much of the past seven years, they were rarely seen apart.

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Schedule small breaks. Put tech breaks on your calendar. It may feel strange to plan something like “taking a phone-free walk,” said one expert, but that shouldn’t happen if it’s a priority.

Control your environment. Don’t rely solely on willpower. Adjust your environment to keep your phone away: set an alarm clock, delete social media apps, or ask a family member to remind you to put the phone down.

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For more than a decade, Apple could do virtually nothing wrong. The iPhone made it the most valuable company in the world. The App Store helped launch companies like Uber and Airbnb. And the company’s new products made it a player in healthcare, Hollywood and finance.

Now the difficulties are piling up. The Justice Department on Thursday filed an antitrust lawsuit against Apple for giving its own products benefits that it took away from competitors. The lawsuit is the latest in a series of lawsuits brought against the company by regulators on three continents.

The problems are testing the resilience of the Apple brand and undermining its business dominance, even as Apple products remain popular and continue to power a highly profitable business. The company reported a profit of $97 billion on revenue of $386 billion last year.

Here’s a look at the challenges ahead.

US v Apple

The Justice Department filed a sweeping antitrust lawsuit against Apple on Thursday, directly targeting the company’s most important business: the iPhone. The government argued in an 88-page lawsuit that Apple violated antitrust laws by preventing other companies from offering applications that compete with Apple products, such as its digital wallet.

The lawsuit follows a yearslong investigation into Apple that focused on the ways the company controlled the user experience on iPhones and other devices to create what critics call an uneven playing field. It has given its own products and services access to core features like the NFC chip and notification system that it denies to competitors like PayPal and Garmin smartwatches.

It could take months before the case comes to trial.

European regulators against Apple

On March 4, the European Commission fined Apple 1.8 billion euros ($1.95 billion) for thwarting competition by preventing music streaming rivals from offering users promotions and subscription upgrades. Because Apple is the sole gatekeeper controlling developers’ access to iPhone customers, European regulators said it wrote the rules for the App Store in a way that allowed Apple Music to offer benefits that it denied to rivals like Spotify.

“From now on, Apple will have to let music streaming developers communicate freely with their own users,” said Margrethe Vestager, executive vice president of the European Commission in charge of competition policy. The size of the fine, she added, “reflects both Apple’s financial power and the harm Apple’s behavior has caused to millions of European users.”

Since the fine, Apple has postponed a request from Spotify to inform users about offers on its website, Spotify said. The European Commission has said Apple could face additional fines if it doesn’t comply with the orders.

South Korea and the Netherlands against Apple

Apple is also facing fines from regulators in the Netherlands and South Korea.

In 2021, Dutch regulators ruled that Apple violated competition laws in the dating app market by preventing services like Tinder from using payment systems other than Apple’s. Rather than allow other payment systems to take that money, Apple lowered its commission from 30 percent to 27 percent on the price paid per user. But Dutch regulators said the move was inconsistent with the law and fined Apple €50 million ($53 million) last year.

A similar situation is playing out in South Korea, where lawmakers were among the first in the world to respond to developer complaints about App Store commissions by passing legislation forcing Apple to allow alternative payment systems. Apple has relaxed its requirement 26 percent. The country’s telecom regulator said this Apple could be fined $15.4 million for ‘unfair practices’.

Apple said it disagreed with the findings of Dutch and South Korean regulators. It is appealing against the Dutch fine and is awaiting the results of a South Korean investigation.

Japan, Australia and Great Britain against Apple

Several other countries are exploring legislation or regulations that could force Apple to loosen its grip, including Japan, Australia and Britain. The regulatory changes they are discussing could require Apple to offer alternative payment options and reduce its commissions. After seeing how Apple has complied with similar laws elsewhere, lawmakers may choose to be more prescriptive in their regulations.

The rules would be the latest to split what was once one App Store into a tangle of digital stores across national borders.

China vs Apple

Last fall, China began telling government agency employees not to use iPhones for work. Authorities made no public statements other than to say there were “media reports” about security flaws in iPhones. But the directive has spread throughout the country’s smartphone market.

iPhone sales in China fell 24 percent in the first six weeks of the year, according to Counterpoint Research, which tracks the smartphone industry. At the same time, sales of Huawei, once China’s largest smartphone maker, rose 64 percent after introducing a new phone with 5G wireless capabilities.

Epic vs. Apple

Apple largely triumphed over Epic Games, the maker of Fortnite, after the video game company sued Apple in 2020 over its App Store. But a federal judge has dealt a major blow to Apple’s control of the App Store, ruling that Apple violated California competition laws by preventing app makers from offering alternative ways to pay for services.

After the Supreme Court decided not to hear the case, Apple said it would comply with the ruling, just as it did in the Netherlands: by lowering the commission to 27 percent for developers who use alternative payment options.

Last week, Epic filed a motion in court challenging Apple’s compliance, saying the new fees and rules undermine the judge’s order. Meta and Microsoft have filed a brief in support of Epic, prompting the court to once again decide whether Apple is violating California law.

Developers vs. Apple

Before European regulators this month began enforcing a new competition law to give customers more choice, app makers complained that Apple’s response to the law broke the rules. The company would open the iPhone to alternative app stores and payment systems, but added these capabilities alongside new commissions and requirements.

On Monday, developers met with Apple in Europe and questioned how the fees complied with the law, which has several “free” provisions. Apple has insisted that its policies comply with the new rules.

European regulators could open a formal investigation into Apple’s plans. The lawsuit could spark a protracted legal battle that could force Apple to change or face fines of up to 10 percent of its annual global revenue, which was nearly $400 billion last year.

Wall Street vs. Apple

Apple’s investors are calling to jump into the world of generative artificial intelligence. The technology, which can answer questions, create images and write code, is being praised for its potential to create trillions of dollars in economic value.

But at a time when peers like Microsoft and Google are starting to build generative AI companies, Apple has yet to introduce a product. Apple CEO Tim Cook has assured investors that something is coming later this year. The company has been in talks with Google about adding its AI model called Gemini to iPhones.

Investors have sent Apple shares down more than 3.75 percent this year. At the same time, the Nasdaq Composite Index, packed with technology stocks, rose nearly 11 percent.

The Justice Department and 16 attorneys general filed an antitrust lawsuit against Apple on Thursday, the federal government’s main challenge to the reach and influence of the company that has put iPhones in the hands of more than a billion people.

The government argued that Apple had violated antitrust laws by preventing other companies from offering applications that compete with Apple products such as its digital wallets, which could reduce the value of the iPhone. Apple’s policies harm consumers and smaller businesses that compete with certain Apple services, according to excerpts from the lawsuit released by the government and filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey.

“Every step in Apple’s course of action built and strengthened the moat around its smartphone monopoly,” the government said in the lawsuit.

The lawsuit ends years of regulatory scrutiny of Apple’s wildly popular suite of devices and services, which fueled its growth into a nearly $2.75 trillion publicly traded company that was for years the most valuable in the world. It takes direct aim at the iPhone, Apple’s most popular device and most powerful business, and attacks the way the company has made the billions of smartphones it has sold since 2007 the centerpiece of its empire.

By tightly controlling the user experience on iPhones and other devices, Apple has created an uneven playing field, where critics grant its own products and services access to core features that competitors deny.. Over the years, it has restricted financial companies’ access to the phone’s payment chip and Bluetooth trackers by using its location service feature. It is also easier for users to connect Apple products, such as smartwatches and laptops, to iPhone than to products from other manufacturers.

The company says this makes its iPhones more secure than other smartphones. But app developers and rival device makers say Apple is using its power to crush the competition.

“This lawsuit threatens who we are and the principles that distinguish Apple products in fiercely competitive markets,” an Apple spokeswoman said. “If this succeeds, it would hinder our ability to create the kind of technology people expect from Apple – at the intersection of hardware, software and services. It would also set a dangerous precedent, giving the government the power to take a heavy hand in designing people’s technology.”

Apple has effectively fought other antitrust challenges. In an App Store policy lawsuit brought by Epic Games, the maker of Fortnite, in 2020, Apple convinced a judge that customers could easily switch between its iPhone operating system and Google’s Android system. It has presented data showing that the reason few customers switch phones is their loyalty to the iPhone.

It also has has defended its business practices in the past saying that the approach has “always been to make the pie bigger” and “create more opportunities, not just for our company, but for artists, makers, entrepreneurs and anyone who is ‘crazy’ with a big idea.”

Every modern tech giant now faces a major federal antitrust challenge. The Justice Department is also pursuing a case against Google’s search operations, and another focuses on Google’s power over advertising technology. The Federal Trade Commission has filed a lawsuit accusing Facebook owner Meta of thwarting competition when it bought Instagram and WhatsApp. Another committee accused Amazon of abusing its power over online retail. The FTC also tried unsuccessfully to prevent Microsoft from acquiring video game publisher Activision Blizzard.

The lawsuits reflect an effort by regulators to increase scrutiny of companies’ role as gatekeepers of commerce and communications. In 2019, the agencies under President Donald J. Trump opened antitrust investigations into Google, Meta, Amazon and Apple. The Biden administration has put even more energy into these efforts, appointing critics of the tech giants to lead both the FTC and the Justice Department’s antitrust division.

In Europe, regulators recently punished Apple for preventing music streaming competitors from communicating with users about promotions and options to upgrade their subscriptions, with a fine of 1.8 billion euros. App makers have also called on the European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm, to investigate claims that Apple is violating a new law requiring the company to open iPhones to third-party app stores.

In South Korea and the The NetherlandsThe company is facing possible fines due to the fees app developers charge for using alternative payment processors. Other countries, including Britain, Australia and Japan, are considering rules that would undermine Apple’s grip on the app economy.

The Justice Department, which began its investigation into Apple in 2019, has chosen to build a broader and more ambitious case than any other regulator has brought against the company. Rather than focusing solely on the App Store, as European regulators have done, the app focused on Apple’s entire ecosystem of products and services.

The lawsuit filed Thursday targets a group of practices that the government says Apple has used to strengthen its dominance.

The company is “undermining” the ability of iPhone users to send messages to owners of other types of smartphones, such as those running the Android operating system, the government said. That gap — epitomized by the green bubbles showing an Android owner’s messages — sent a signal that other smartphones were of lower quality than the iPhone, according to the lawsuit.

Apple has similarly made it difficult for the iPhone to work with smartwatches other than its own Apple Watch, the government argued. Once an iPhone user owns an Apple Watch, it becomes much more expensive for them to throw the phone away.

The government also said that Apple had tried to maintain its monopoly by not allowing other companies to build their own digital wallets. Apple Wallet is the only app on the iPhone that can use the chip, also called NFC, that allows a phone to tap at checkout to pay. While Apple encourages banks and credit card companies to make their products work in Apple Wallet, it prevents them from accessing the chip and creating their own wallets as an alternative for customers.

The government also said that Apple refuses to allow game streaming apps that could make the iPhone a less valuable piece of hardware or provide “super apps” that allow users to perform various activities from a single application.