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The electronics giant Apple is the subject of an inquiry by Italy's antitrust watchdog, which was announced on Thursday. Apple is accused of abusing its dominating position in the app industry.
The technology behemoth from Silicon Valley "has adopted a more restrictive privacy policy for third-party app developers than it applies to itself," the competition watchdog said in a statement.
Additionally, the company expressed worry that third-party advertisers and developers were "disadvantaged in terms of the quality of the data made available by Apple".
In addition, the "alleged discriminatory conduct" could deter rivals from entering or remaining in the market for app creation and distribution, which would be advantageous for Apple's own apps.
In the first three months of this year, Apple posted a $24 billion profit on $94.8 billion in revenue.
Large fines and legislation to limit their market dominance have resulted from increased scrutiny of US big tech companies' business practices in Europe.
