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Politics

Apple and Google Are Brawling With Peers Over Future of the App Store

App store legislation has emerged as flash point because it has the best chance of becoming law among a handful of bills aimed at reining in tech giants

illustration for tech lobbying story

Illustration: Graham Roumieu

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A push in Congress to regulate digital app stores has pitted Apple Inc. and Alphabet Inc. against Microsoft Corp. and others in a showdown of some of the nation’s biggest technology companies.

The Open App Markets Act focuses on a narrow slice of the sprawling internet economy: the billions in fees collected by app-store operators. The legislation has emerged as a flash point because it has the best chance of becoming law among a handful of bills aimed at reining in Big Tech.