The U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against Apple and several
book publishers this morning, claiming that they worked together to
artificially prop up prices for e-books.
The publishers sued were Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Penguin,
and Simon & Schuster. The suit was filed in a district court in New
York.
“Apple facilitated the publisher defendants’ collective effort
to end retail price competition by coordinating their transition to an
agency model across all retailers,” according to the complaint.
Apple and Macmillan haven’t engaged in settlement talks with the Justice Department, Bloomberg reported.
The companies have denied any wrongdoing and will argue that their
agreement actually improved the competitive environment in the face of
competition from Amazon and its own e-book business.
