After removing the popular social network Parler from the App Store, Apple is now considering bringing it back however it comes with a catch. Apple’s CEO Tim Cook has said that if the company is willing to change how it moderates posts on the platform, the app will be again available for downloads via App Store. It is to note that Apple had suspended all Parler app downloads on the back of the attack on the US Capitol on January 6. Apple said that postings on the platform had the potential to further incite violence. Not just Apple, but Google as well as Amazon also did not support Parler on the similar grounds.
Cook, according to media reports, said that the company suspended Parler as it was favored by supporters of President Donald Trump. “We looked at the incitement to violence that was on there, and we don’t consider that free speech and incitement to violence has an intersection,” a report by AFP quoted Apple CEO as saying.
According to Cook, as far as Apple is concerned, the company has only suspended the application and if they work on the platform and get their moderation right, the app can go back on the app store. Parler turned out to be one of the top downloaded applications from the App store in the US shortly after Donald Trump’s Twitter account was banned on the back of the Capitol attack. Cook said that Apple does not control what is there on the internet but “we’ve never viewed that our platform should be a simple replication of the internet.”There are rules and regulations and people should abide by those, Cook added.
On Monday, Parler also sued Amazon as its Web Services cut off the platform’s access to Internet servers. According to Parler, Amazon was in violation of antitrust laws and alleged that it was acting to help Twitter, which is a rival for Parler.
Google too took action and banned downloads of the Parler app.
