Would this means that it will be criminal to allow companies to create alternative clients? That is really interesting development.
Do we know that to be true?
In any case, I'm pretty sure they don't bring criminal cases like this frivolously. There's obviously something here.
They were not charged for special API access? Still, FB might have used this as a negotiating tool as they dealt with Apple, Microsoft etc etc
It seems like Facebook somehow gave these partners rather deep access. To all users, not just those using those phones or who opted into the arrangement.
And for phone deals, criticizing friends/deep data access... If you want to build alternative FB client, your phone have to have access not just to your data, but also to your fiends data (i.e. all data you have access), in order to provide any useful service. So yes, technically your friends didn't agree that your alternative FB app can access to their data, but you gave your access credentials (and permissions) to access that data to your phone.