On Friday, the leaders of a Congressional Subcommittee sent a letter to Apple questioning whether its guidelines might “restrict emerging technologies like blockchains, nonfungible tokens (NFTs), and other distributed ledger technologies.”
The letter was from Representatives Gus Bilirakis (Republican Chair) and Jan Schakowsky (Democrat Ranking Member), who head the Innovation, Data, and Commerce Subcommittee. While most of the letter was a set of questions for Apple about its app store approval process, it opened with examples of restrictions on NFTs experienced by Coinbase and Axie Infinity.
In December, Coinbase said that Apple blocked its IOS mobile app update and the exchange had to remove NFT transfers to get a revised app accepted. Apple wants its cut of the blockchain gas fees that have to be paid to execute NFT transfers. “Apple’s proprietary In-App Purchase system does not support crypto so we couldn’t comply even if we tried,” Coinbase wrote on Twitter.
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