No, Apple is not working on a tool to facilitate iOS migration to Android

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Apple today shot down a report published last Sunday by The Telegraph newspaper that it was building a tool at the request of EU carriers that would permit iPhone owners to transfer their contacts, photographs, messages and other data to Android smartphones.

“There is no truth to this rumor,” a spokesperson told John Paczkowski at Buzz Feed.

“We are entirely focused on switching users from Android to iPhone, and that is going great,” Apple spokesperson Trudy Muller said in a written statement.

According to Tim Cook, almost one-third of iPhones sold during the company’s September 2015 quarter came from people switching over from the Android platform.

“There would have been some switchers on top of that from other operating systems, but obviously Android is the largest one by far,” Cook said on a conference call.

The Telegraph contended that major European carriers were pushing Apple to develop such a tool over fear that the lack of switching from the iPhone to Android was weakening their hand in business negotiations with Apple.

“Telecoms operators are concerned that only a tiny fraction of customers ever move off the iPhone, in part because of the technical hassle of transferring data,” said the report.

The story immediately struck me as odd. Even if carriers’ fear was founded, it would have been the responsibility of Google, or handset makers—or even carriers, but certainly not Apple—to provide such a tool to their customers.

Source: Buzz Feed News