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Dash developer's response to Apple's response

blog.kapeli.com

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Re: Dash developer's response to Apple's response

#31

Post by Mithaldu »

eridius wrote: post #26
Mithaldu wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The unreasonable parts are: - Apple assumed, and let these assumptions stay untested, and particularly failed to reach out to the different contact details on all involved accounts. - Apple admits they terminated his account in error, yet blackmail him in refusing to reinstate unless he makes a blog post. (Actual contents of the post irrelevant to the point at hand.)

Where did they say they terminated his account in error? On the recorded call they made it very clear that the accounts were linked and that Apple believes that to be accurate. The fact that they're willing to provide Kapeli with a way to get his account unlinked and reinstated does not mean they were incorrect in the first place.

Apple representative states there was no wrongdoing on Kapeli's side. Absent any wrongdoing on his side the termination is in error. Additionally they made the error of not contacting the holders of all accounts involved.

Re: Dash developer's response to Apple's response

#32

Post by eridius »

Mithaldu wrote: post #9
6nf wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt a relative would post literally thousands of fake reviews over the course of many months without the dev's knowledge

Read the post again. Kapeli paid for the dev fee for an account he did not make or control, and gave the person controlling that account hardware he had bought. Apple proceeded to pull a facebook and marked the two accounts as linked and treated them as being the same person. Then the person controlling said account started doing shady stuff, followed by Apple dinging them, but failing to actually follow up with Kape…

> but failing to actually follow up with Kapeli's account to see whether that one is actually and in reality controlled by the same person

That doesn't make sense. We're talking about anti-fraud measures here. If they contacted the other account and said "hey are you the same person as this first account?" a fraudster would always say no even if the same person controls both accounts!

Re: Dash developer's response to Apple's response

#33

Post by dragonwriter »

So, Apple wanted to secretly pay the developer (via removing a penalty they had imposed) to produce PR material regarding the trustworthiness of their actions in the Developer Program.

That's pretty much the same thing they claimed was the basis of the account suspension, if you think about it. Guess it's a "good for me, but not for thee" kind of thing.

Re: Dash developer's response to Apple's response

#35

Post by blah-blah-blah »

Mithaldu wrote: post #9
6nf wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt a relative would post literally thousands of fake reviews over the course of many months without the dev's knowledge

Read the post again. Kapeli paid for the dev fee for an account he did not make or control, and gave the person controlling that account hardware he had bought. Apple proceeded to pull a facebook and marked the two accounts as linked and treated them as being the same person. Then the person controlling said account started doing shady stuff, followed by Apple dinging them, but failing to actually follow up with Kape…

On the other hand, while this might not be the way Apple should have communicated. They do have a point.

A linked account was involved in fraudulent activity. Its easy for anyone to say 'Oh, i just paid for that and gave my hardware but thats not mine'. Still doesn't change the reasons for suspicion.

It does suck since I really like Dash. One reason why you should not share/use your work CC/bank accounts and Hardware for non-work reasons.

Re: Dash developer's response to Apple's response

#36

Post by foota »

jbob2000 wrote: post #30
nihonde wrote: post #4

Eh? It's very vague in the blog post, but it sounds like the developer paid for an Apple account and the device which were used to create fraudulent reviews. That last looks quite bad and makes Apple's position more understandable. Why isn't the developer explaining what happened with the dev account that they opened and funded? You can't just say "I haven't done anything wrong" under those circumstances without expl…

Did we read the same article? He used his credit card to pay for a friend's developer account and gave her one of his old devices to test on. Though he didn't mention it (sticking to facts) it looks like he was teaching someone how to make an iOS app and provided a bit of charity.

The question is why was that account involved in review manipulation

Re: Dash developer's response to Apple's response

#37

Post by eridius »

Mithaldu wrote: post #31
eridius wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did they say they terminated his account in error? On the recorded call they made it very clear that the accounts were linked and that Apple believes that to be accurate. The fact that they're willing to provide Kapeli with a way to get his account unlinked and reinstated does not mean they were incorrect in the first place.

Apple representative states there was no wrongdoing on Kapeli's side. Absent any wrongdoing on his side the termination is in error. Additionally they made the error of not contacting the holders of all accounts involved.

Kapeli did not commit fraud. But that does not mean Apple was incorrect in linking the two accounts. In fact, 20 seconds into the call, the Apple rep says

> We don't believe that there was a mistake here, right. We don't think that we made a mistake.

So no, Apple is very explicitly saying they were not in error.

Re: Dash developer's response to Apple's response

#38

Post by Mithaldu »

eridius wrote: post #32
Mithaldu wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read the post again. Kapeli paid for the dev fee for an account he did not make or control, and gave the person controlling that account hardware he had bought. Apple proceeded to pull a facebook and marked the two accounts as linked and treated them as being the same person. Then the person controlling said account started doing shady stuff, followed by Apple dinging them, but failing to actually follow up with Kape…

> but failing to actually follow up with Kapeli's account to see whether that one is actually and in reality controlled by the same person That doesn't make sense. We're talking about anti-fraud measures here. If they contacted the other account and said "hey are you the same person as this first account?" a fraudster would always say no even if the same person controls both accounts!

There are various ways to verify. Photo id, state id, holders of other associated credit cards (particularly where the cash for the app payments go to). I'm not saying they should ask nicely, but do due diligence.

Re: Dash developer's response to Apple's response

#39

Post by sams99 »

The flip side of this story is ...

How would you feel if someone swiped a copy of your cc, started an apple developer account, did a bunch of review freud and then got you kicked out of the app store.

I think there are some serious issues around due process with account termination. If something like this was sent originally this would be a non issue.

> We detected freud from account X that is linked using your credit card number to account Y. ... bla bla bla freud is bad ... respond within N hours or have your account terminated.

Re: Dash developer's response to Apple's response

#40

Post by IBM »

Mithaldu wrote: post #27
madeofpalk wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure there was much more communication than just that call. Apple, in a previous statement, said "Warning was given in advance of the termination and attempts were made to resolve the issue with the developer but they were unsuccessful"

Listen to the phone call. He asks them why they contacted only the owner of the linked account and not the details on his account before closing his account, and Apple does not deny they failed to contact him and only says "cause they were linked". There was no other communication with Kapeli.

They also told him that, from their perspective, the two accounts belong to the same entity because they have the same payment details and test devices.

There was no reason for them to know that this developer purchased an account for someone else and gave them his test devices (which sounds like an excuse anyone accused of anything gives when they're caught).

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