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A top-grossing scam on the App Store

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Re: A top-grossing scam on the App Store

#51

Post by Shivetya »

WesolyKubeczek wrote: post #39

Remember, the App Store offers you the most secure, curated, and safe experience you can ever have with your Apple devices. Each app submitted to the App Store undergoes a thorough review process. Each app update is checked and approved by an Apple employee. It's not like some automated process which you can game left and right. Each app on the App Store is guaranteed, thanks to the strict review process, to adhere t…

Plus depending on news source Apple supposedly can get close to a hundred thousand apps submitted each week.[0]

That staggering number of apps is bound to have leakage of the bad sort and as long as Apple has in place a means to report them then they should be given some leeway. If there is no process (I really don't know) then yeah we should call them out on it.

[0]https://appleinsider.com/articles/20/09/24/app-store-rejecte...

Re: A top-grossing scam on the App Store

#52

Post by socialist_coder »

The scam really is about the iOS Subscriptions and how its easy to have a free trial then auto-bill you for some absurd amount. Very easy to trick people into doing this.

Apple should just remove Subscriptions completely and have app developers turn them into consumable IAPs that you have to buy every X months.

The app developer can still do a free trial in their own code.

Games do this all the time with "premium". You buy 30 days of Premium for $5. 30 days later its done and you have to buy it again. No auto-recurring subscriptions.

Re: A top-grossing scam on the App Store

#54

Post by tolmasky »

Apple has just engineered the worst possible situation for themselves by being the only way to get apps on the store and by simultaneously incessantly marketing the store as "Safe and Secure". The former encourages them to maximize the number of apps on the store, while the latter encourages them to shoot first and ask questions later.

If side-loading or alternative ways of getting apps onto the iPhone existed, then they could implement far stricter controls knowing that, worst case scenario, you can still get an app onto the iPhone. This is how it works on the Mac. Tor isn't on the Mac App Store, but that of course doesn't mean Tor can't be used on the Mac.

This is one of the tricky parts about AppStore discussions, it's not about being for or against the AppStore. In fact, I wish the AppStore was MUCH pickier about the apps it let in, and I also wish there was an alternative to the AppStore to catch cases that didn't meet that strict bar. Then the AppStore could actually be about curation as opposed to fear-induced isolationism. Then Apple wouldn't have to inadvertently have political side-effects when it disallowed apps like HKMap.live.

Being on the AppStore could still be advantageous beyond just "either that or you don't get to be on the iPhone at all.” Apple payment processing, iCloud integrations, Family-sharing, etc. could all be tied to being ON the AppStore, so there'd still be a huge incentive to try to ship that way. And side-loading doesn't have to be easy or even on by default.

Re: A top-grossing scam on the App Store

#55

Post by sjg007 »

Google isn't immune either I suspect. Before the app store, I discovered a google search scam for usps change of address. You can fill that out for free at usps.com or in the post office, but if you search for it, a bunch of scammy providers offered to do it for you for $20. They were buying google ads so that their links appeared before the usps. They would come from somewhat legit looking domains too. I think part of the issue is that usps.com is the official site vs usps.gov.

Re: A top-grossing scam on the App Store

#56

Post by WesolyKubeczek »

s_dev wrote: post #44
WesolyKubeczek wrote: post #39

Remember, the App Store offers you the most secure, curated, and safe experience you can ever have with your Apple devices. Each app submitted to the App Store undergoes a thorough review process. Each app update is checked and approved by an Apple employee. It's not like some automated process which you can game left and right. Each app on the App Store is guaranteed, thanks to the strict review process, to adhere t…

>Each app submitted to the App Store undergoes a thorough review process. Thats just not true though -- it does go through a review but the quality of that review is not remotely consistent. I've litterally had reviewers 'reject' an app because they couldn't log in and said I didn't provide the right details. Basically they copied the email or password incorrectly. Note they didn't copy and paste -- just wrote it wro…

> Thats just not true though -- it does go through a review but the quality of that review is not remotely consistent.

Still, it's way better than any competing app store for iOS apps in existence!

Well duh, of course I'm being sarcastic. I'm of the opinion that Apple should get all possible roasting for their review process, since they designate themselves as the only gatekeepers in the ecosystem. Even if you can do better... You can't. They won't let you.

Re: A top-grossing scam on the App Store

#57

Post by Shivetya »

heavyset_go wrote: post #4

Apple and Google are poor stewards of the mobile app distribution market. It's time that their 13+ year stranglehold on app distribution is disrupted.

Do you even understand the volume of apps they deal with? Apple claims 100k a week[0]. How do you propose to handle that?

People are complaining about a small number of bad apps getting through and at the same time we have quite a few stating that not allowing people to load up anything they want is bad. Can you imagine trying to sort through the mess if there was no gate keeper because there is an actual chance if people get their legislative wish list through.

Even if you could get an independent system up and running who is going to pay for it? The staffing is going to be very large and who determines what is a good app and what is not?

I am all for Apple having and managing their store by their rules. While I think it is dumber than all get out to allow for people to install any app they find I am certainly not going to stand in their way as long as the companies which make the phones and provide the software are fully protected from such a choice. After all if a rogue app does something bad who do you think the lawyers will come for?

[0]https://appleinsider.com/articles/20/09/24/app-store-rejecte...

Re: A top-grossing scam on the App Store

#58

Post by egocentric »

Shivetya wrote: post #51
WesolyKubeczek wrote: post #39

Remember, the App Store offers you the most secure, curated, and safe experience you can ever have with your Apple devices. Each app submitted to the App Store undergoes a thorough review process. Each app update is checked and approved by an Apple employee. It's not like some automated process which you can game left and right. Each app on the App Store is guaranteed, thanks to the strict review process, to adhere t…

Plus depending on news source Apple supposedly can get close to a hundred thousand apps submitted each week.[0] That staggering number of apps is bound to have leakage of the bad sort and as long as Apple has in place a means to report them then they should be given some leeway. If there is no process (I really don't know) then yeah we should call them out on it. [0] https://appleinsider.com/articles/20/09/24/app-sto…

Apple removed the “Report a Problem” button they used to have on the App Store for each app: https://twitter.com/keleftheriou/status/1381463249749565440?...

Re: A top-grossing scam on the App Store

#59

Post by ProjectArcturis »

tolmasky wrote: post #54

Apple has just engineered the worst possible situation for themselves by being the only way to get apps on the store and by simultaneously incessantly marketing the store as "Safe and Secure". The former encourages them to maximize the number of apps on the store, while the latter encourages them to shoot first and ask questions later. If side-loading or alternative ways of getting apps onto the iPhone existed, then…

If they allowed side-loading, they might not capture 30% of revenue from apps sold through the app store. If they disallowed scams, they might not capture 30% of the scammers' revenue.

Re: A top-grossing scam on the App Store

#60

Post by simonw »

I got scammed on the App Store a couple of weeks ago.

I needed the SmartThings app for some Samsung home automation devices, searched for it, and installed this one:

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/smart-things-smart-view-app/id...

When it charged me a $20/year subscription (now cancelled) I thought "Wow, Samsung charging me for this feels pretty cheap of them, but I guess that's how they do things - after all, I found this on the App Store".

The app I should have installed was this one: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/smartthings/id1222822904

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