The European Commission said on Monday it is launching an investigation into alleged anti-competitive practices of Apple's App Store.
The commission said it will examine Apple's practice of charging alternative app stores and app developers a fee every time an iPhone user installs their software, a commission statement said.
It is also looking into the steps Apple device users have to go through to use an alternative app store, as well as Apple's eligibility criteria for developers to supply iPhone apps via the web, instead of through the Apple App Store.
The investigation concerns the European Union's Digital Markets Act (DMA), which regulates the behaviour of digital "gatekeepers," meaning companies that hold powerful, entrenched positions in the EU's digital economy, acting as intermediaries between many users and businesses.
The commission also announced that it had sent Apple a "preliminary view" that the company violated the DMA by preventing developers from freely steering users outside Apple's App Store ecosystem, as part of an investigation opened in March. The opinion is not final.