Epic Games alleges the coordinated efforts of the two tech giants to block competition in app distribution on Samsung devices.
American game developer and publisher Epic Games is no longer holding back as it sues tech giants, Google and Samsung. The publisher files a suit because of “soft-blocking” enforced by the two on third-party app stores.
Epic Games specifically mentioned the Auto Blocker feature by Samsung. This feature limits Samsung devices with One UI 6.1 to get apps from the Play Store and Samsung Galaxy Store.
Google got into the situation because the publisher claims that the Android owner has “the habit of paying OEMs billions to prevent competition.” Evidence during the Epic v Google trial unveiled the schemes so Samsung won’t compete with the Play Store.
But what exactly is the problem? The Auto Blocker. Introduced in October 2023, this feature prevents users from installing apps from sources other than the Play Store and Samsung Galaxy Store. This was changed in July 2024 letting users change the settings to download and install from other sources, much like how “unknown sources” work on vanilla Android.
While some users are familiar with the steps to disable “unknown sources” protection on Android, many are not and the warnings are quite daunting. One major Chinese brand has a scary “Danger” screen and a 10-second timer before a user can override the protection.
Epic Games is asking the court for fair competition and mandates Samsung to remove the Auto Blocker by default.
Have you experienced issues with titles from Epic Games on your Samsung device?
