Readers may recall that Japan recently passed the Smartphone Act, officially the Bill on the Promotion of Competition for Specified Software Used in Smartphones. Among its most important reforms is a direct prohibition on Apple’s long-standing ban on third-party browser engines on iOS.
This ban has functioned as an effective ban on browsers like Firefox, Chrome, Edge, Opera, Brave & Vivaldi, by forcing them to use Apple’s WebKit engine, which they cannot modify or control. This results in no effective browser competition on iOS, and web apps being deprived of the APIs and performance they need to compete with native apps.
The legislation was based on the Final Report by Japan’s Headquarters for Digital Market Competition, a report Open Web Advocacy consulted on. Our submission is available here.
Last week, Japan published the Mobile Software Competition Act (MSCA) Guidelines. These subordinate rules clarify how the Act will be interpreted and enforced. Here's what they mean for browser competition.
# Ban on Blocking or Hindering Alternative Browser Engines
The guidelines explicitly prohibit any measures that would prevent or hinder the adoption of third-party browser engines:
Actions that "Prevent" the Adoption of Alternative Browser Engines"
Such actions may include: imposing unreasonable technical restrictions on individual app providers while allowing them to adopt alternative browser engines, placing excessive financial burdens on individual app providers for adopting alternative browser engines, and steering smartphone users away from using individual software that incorporates alternative browser engines.
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