Epic Games, the creator of the popular video game Fortnite, has accused Alphabet's Google and Samsung, the world's largest Android phone manufacturer, of colluding to shield Google's Play store from competition. On Monday, Epic announced plans to file a lawsuit in a U.S. federal court in California, alleging that Samsung's smartphone security feature, Auto Blocker, was actually designed to discourage users from downloading Android apps from sources other than the Play store or Samsung's Galaxy store, which the Korean company chose to deprioritize.
Epic claims that Samsung and Google are violating U.S. antitrust laws by limiting consumer options and stifling competition, which would otherwise drive down app costs. The game company further asserts that Samsung's Auto Blocker was created to counteract the impact of a U.S. verdict in Epic's favor against Google in December 2023, a ruling that is expected to compel Google to make apps more accessible from other sources.
Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney described the lawsuit as part of a "major global fight" to protect competition and its benefits for consumers. Samsung introduced Auto Blocker on its smartphones in late 2023 as an opt-in feature to safeguard users from potentially harmful apps. However, Epic alleges that Samsung made Auto Blocker the default setting in July and deliberately made it challenging to disable or bypass.
Based in Cary, North Carolina, Epic Games initially sued Google in 2020, accusing the tech giant of stifling competition through its control over app distribution and payments. In that ongoing case, U.S. District Judge James Donato in San Francisco is considering what changes Google must implement in its app business following the jury's December 2023 finding that Google held an illegal monopoly.
