The Judge makes his Decision. The Antitrust Complaint brought by Cydia against Apple can now proceed.

Apple had requested that the complaint be dismissed by Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers.

According to Reuters, Cydia's antitrust complaint against Apple can proceed. After rejecting Apple's request to dismiss the complaint, Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, who presided over the dispute between Apple and Epic Games, decided on Thursday that Cydia's founder, Jay "Saurik" Freeman, could bring his claim against the corporation. Freeman filed his first lawsuit against Apple in late 2020, arguing that the firm had a "illegal monopoly over iOS app distribution." Cydia's initial lawsuit against Apple was dismissed by Judge Gonzalez Rogers, who ruled that the litigation was barred by the statute of limitations. She did, however, give Freeman permission to change his case, which he did. Cydia claims in its new complaint that Apple's iOS releases between 2018 and 2021 constituted "overt" conduct that affected distributors like it. Judge Gonzalez Rogers judged the claim convincing enough to investigate. "To the degree that plaintiff's claims rely on Apple's technological improvements to prevent Cydia from operating at all, such claims are current," the judge wrote in her decision. Cydia is suing Apple for damages (the firm stopped processing payments in 2018) and aims to persuade the tech giant to allow third-party payments and software distribution on iOS. The Senate Judiciary Committee just advanced the Open App Markets Act, which would allow more competition in the App Store. The law, if passed, would compel Apple to allow side loading on iOS and prohibit the corporation from tying developers into its payment system. In 2018, Freeman closed the Cydia shop. According to the new complaint, Apple made "more aggressive" alterations to iOS from 2018 to 2021, preventing Cydia and other alternative app stores from selling "useable" software for iPhones. Meanwhile, Epic Games, the creator of the Fortnite video game, has questioned Apple's stance on third-party app shops threaten the iPhone's security. Epic argued in a new court filing that if Apple can enable side loading on Mac devices while still calling them secure, it can undoubtedly do the same for iPhones. In the Epic Games v. Apple district court lawsuit last year, a US judge determined that Apple did not have a monopoly in the relevant market. However, a California court ruled that Apple could not prevent developers from including links to other payment systems that are not reliant on the App Store. Allowing side loading, according to Apple, puts consumers' "most sensitive and confidential information" at risk.