Apple is at the center of an antitrust lawsuit in the United States seeking information from Samsung in South Korea. Neither Samsung nor the U.S. Justice Department have been able to stop Apple’s request in U.S. courts to obtain data critical to its defense from the top of Samsung’s corporate structure in South Korea. Apple is accused of restricting competition through proprietary hardware and software.
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The US Department of Justice is seeking to prove that Apple is preventing companies like Samsung from easily serving its customer base.
The trial is still in the early evidence-gathering stage, and Samsung's US headquarters has refused to cooperate. As a result, Apple has sought and has now been granted permission to use the Hague Convention to engage the South Korean government and force Samsung to comply in that country.
AppleInsider has seen the brief document submission showing that the request was approved. It states that “the court will execute the submitted Request Letter for International Legal Assistance.”
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Samsung claims it cannot hand over evidence stored in its parent company's databases in South Korea, arguing that since it is not part of Samsung America, it hopes the court will agree that it is not relevant.
The Justice Department also argued that Apple's request should be denied, claiming that Apple was too late in filing the request. However, none of the arguments were successful, and Apple's request was limited enough to be granted. The court will now file a request with the South Korean government, asking it to compel Samsung to hand over the relevant documents.
That doesn't mean Apple will get away with it. The South Korean government could disagree with the scope of the request or reject it altogether. There's also a chance Samsung could retaliate in Korea as well.
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It's too early for this case. Apple was sued by the Department of Justice in March 2024, and the first requests for evidence were made in October 2025. It's expected that this case will take the better part of the next decade to reach any kind of conclusion.
