"Sideloading is a cybercriminal's best friend"
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Google lowers Play Store fees for music apps and subscriptions
Google has said that it is lowering its commission fees for all…
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Apple finally lets users report scams and frauds on App Store
With an increasing number of frauds and scams on the App Store, Apple has finally added an option to report them.
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Epic vs Apple: Judge rules Apple must allow App Store developers to link to third party payment options
According to the ruling, Apple’s practices are anti-competitive, and the company must allow App Store developers to redirect to third-party payment options.
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South Korea is the first country to declare war on Google and Apple commissions
Google and Apple are in trouble in South Korea as the Korean…
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Apple is all in on CSAM but report suggests the App Store is not a child safe place
A new report claims that the Apple App Store platform allows children to access adult-only applications and existing CSAM policies are not effective.
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Apple explains why sideloading and third-party app stores are bad
Apple has shared a new document today that describes what significant role…
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US House Committee asks Apple to improve credibility of App Store privacy labels
Apple recently implemented new App Store policies that required all developers to disclose the data collection behavior of their apps as a measure of transparency. However, an investigative report by The Washington Post’s Geoffrey Fowler revealed that privacy disclosures for many apps were misleading, and in some cases, downright inaccurate. In the wake of the revelation, Apple has been asked by the United States House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce to improve the validity of the app privacy labels so that users can get reliable information about the apps they are going to install, or already have, on their devices.
Apple has been asked to explain its auditing process for app privacy disclosures
“A privacy label is no protection if it is false. We urge Apple to improve the validity of its App Privacy labels to ensure consumers are provided meaningful information about their apps’ data practices and that consumers are not harmed by these potentially deceptive practices,” wrote the committee in its letter addressed to Apple CEO Tim Cook. The letter adds that in the absence of accurate information, Apple’s seemingly benevolent policy could become a source of confusion and harm to users for whom the privacy-centric policy was drafted in the first place.
In light of recent reports suggesting @Apple’s new App Privacy labels are often misleading or inaccurate, Chairs @FrankPallone and @janschakowsky are urging Apple to review and improve its system.https://t.co/bYadHw395v
— Energy and Commerce Committee (@EnergyCommerce) February 9, 2021
More importantly, the US House Committee has sent Apple a series of questions, asking the company to explain the process of checking whether the privacy disclosure provided by developers is accurate or not. Apple has also been asked to reveal how frequently it audits these app privacy disclosures, what method is used to verify the information, and the number of apps that have been audited since the rule was implemented among other crucial questions.
Furthermore, the committee has asked Apple how it will respond if a developer is caught providing an inaccurate app privacy disclosure. Following are some other questions of critical importance whose answers the committee has sought from Apple:
| Does Apple ensure that App Privacy labels are corrected upon the discovery of inaccuracies or misleading information? If not, why not? For each app that has been found to have provided inaccurate or misleading information, how quickly was that label corrected? Does Apple require more in-depth privacy disclosures and conduct more stringent oversight of apps targeted to children under the age of 13? If not, why not? If so, please describe the additional disclosures required and the oversight actions employed for these apps. Providing clear and easily comprehendible privacy information at the point of sale is certainly valuable, but privacy policies are not static. Does Apple notify users when one of their app’s privacy labels has materially changed? If not, why not. If so, how are users notified of such changes? |
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Facebook will urge users to allow activity tracking as stricter Apple policies go into effect
Facebook has been at loggerheads with Apple for while now, but in the past few months, the war of words between the two companies has escalated rapidly over App Store privacy policy updates that will allow users to opt out of ad tracking. Apple has maintained that users must be given a choice and that apps to disclose all tracking and data collection practices via ‘app nutrition labels’ on the App Store. Facebook, on the other hand, is accusing Apple of anti-competitive practices and says that the new policy will hurt small businesses. With Apple refusing to budge, Facebook will now urge users to enable activity tracking to serve them personalized ads via a prompt.
As per a CNBC report, Facebook will start showing a prompt to some users starting today, urging them to enable activity tracking in order to provide them a better ad experience. Of course, users will have the choice to deny the request, or choose to accept it if they want Facebook to collect their data across apps and websites.
Users will still have a choice to enable or reject activity tracking
A screenshot of the prompt shared with CNBC suggests the social media giant will ask users to use their app and website activity to ‘get ads that are more personalized’ and ‘support businesses that rely on ads to reach customers’ via two separate points of persuasion. “These prompts will appear on Apple users’ screens immediately before the Apple pop-up appears,” adds the report.
“To provide a better ads experience, we need permission to use future activity that other apps and websites send us from this device. This won’t give us access to new types of information,” says the prompt. However, the language might change down the road. To recall, Facebook resorted to full-page newspaper ads criticizing Apple, while CEO Mark Zuckerberg has gone on offensive multiple times lately, calling Apple a key competitor and accusing it of favoring its own platform to generate ad revenue while choking the competition.
Apple, on the other hand, has maintained that developers and businesses that fail to comply with the new privacy policies will risk getting their apps banned from the App Store. Last week, it was reported that Facebook is planning to file an anti-trust lawsuit against Apple alleging abuse of absolute control over its app ecosystem and forcing developers to abide by policies that can severely hurt small businesses.
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App Store nutrition labels aren’t always honest about data collection and tracking: Report
With iOS 14, Apple gave a big push to privacy, asking developers to reveal the data they collect, how it is shared, and if it can be used for ad tracking. Many developers – and Facebook, in particular – were not happy, but Apple went ahead with implementing its new policy. On the surface, this seems like a great move when it comes to promoting transparency and awareness, but it appears that these app nutrition labels on App Store might not be always accurate. As per an independent investigation by The Washington Post’s Geoffrey Fowler, privacy disclosures for many apps turned out to be inaccurate and misleading.
“Not necessarily. I downloaded a de-stressing app called the Satisfying Slime Simulator that gets the App Store’s highest-level label for privacy. It turned out to be the wrong kind of slimy, covertly sending information — including a way to track my iPhone — to Facebook, Google and other companies,” Fowler mentioned in his report. He adds that after testing a couple dozen apps , he found that privacy claims made by more than a dozen of those apps were inaccurate.
Apple is apparently not verifying all nutrition labels before they go live
Notably, the detail page of each app also mentions a disclaimer from Apple, which clearly says, “This information has not been verified by Apple.” Now, this is a tad surprising. Apple has been quite vocal about the merits of its new privacy policy updates, and how these disclosures by developers will help users make informed choices. However, if the company doesn’t independently verify the privacy disclosures made by developers, how can users trust if they are actually true? That their data is not being sold to shady advertisers? That their privacy is not being intruded on?
When asked about the same, an Apple spokesperson had this to say: “Apple conducts routine and ongoing audits of the information provided and we work with developers to correct any inaccuracies. Apps that fail to disclose privacy information accurately may have future app updates rejected, or in some cases, be removed from the App Store entirely if they don’t come into compliance.”
Fowler notes that some of the apps that came with a blue checkmark – indicating that they collected no data at all – were sending the phone’s unique ID, also called Apple IDF, to third-parties such as Google and Facebook. Additionally, app nutrition labels don’t always reveal the parties that they are sharing user data with, even if they disclose it honestly.
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Apple pulls another batch of 39,000 games from the App Store in China
In the past few months, Apple has been clamping down aggressively on apps that were listed on the App Store in China without a valid license from the Chinese government. As per a Reuters report, the company has pulled down another batch of 39,000 games from its app repository in China, all of which were axed for not being licensed. This is reportedly the largest single-day purge of apps from the App Store.
Apple purged 46,000 apps in one go
The report adds that Apple removed a total of 46,000 in one go, and some of them were from big-name studios and developers. Among the apps that got axed in Apple’s latest swing are NBA 2K20 and Assassin’s Creed Identity by Ubisoft. Such was the severity of the action that merely 74 out of the top 1,500 games on the App Store in China were left unscathed, while the rest were pulled.
“Apple initially gave game publishers an end-of-June deadline to submit a government-issued licence number enabling users to make in-app purchases in the world’s biggest games market. Apple later extended the deadline to Dec. 31,” the report adds. Earlier this year, Apple kicked out almost 30,000 apps – most of which were games – from the App Store in China as they weren’t approved by the National Press and Publication Administration (NPPA).
Only 74 out of the top 1,500 games on the App Store in China survived
The deadline mentioned above had Apple telling developers that their games would be banned if they didn’t have the requisite NPPA license. Previously, Apple allowed developers to list their apps on the App Store while they waited for NPPA approval, but that is no longer the case. The Chinese government has reportedly been pushing for Apple to close this loophole for a while now.
However, the process of obtaining an NPPA license can be cumbersome for foreign developers, and in most cases, they join hands with a Chinese company as a publishing partner to clear the regulatory hurdles in order to get the government’s nod. As for Apple, China remains not only a key market, but also happens to be a hub of its manufacturing operations, which means a tussle with the Chinese government could end up hurting the Cupertino giant, especially in the wake of recent US-China tensions.
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Apple removes app that promoted secret parties in the middle of a pandemic
If there’s one rule that health experts and authorities have been trying to promote with utmost urgency, it’s that ‘gatherings are bad in a pandemic.’ But just like people who follow an anti-vaccine stance, there are also deniers who refuse to abide by the rules such as wearing masks and avoiding group meets. Not too surprisingly, a networking app was also built to promote secret parties in the midst of an ongoing pandemic. Named Vybe Together, the app has now been pulled from App Store for violating policies, and the TikTok account that was used to promote these underground parties has also been removed.
Get your rebel on. Get your party on
As per a BusinessInsider report, TikTok removed a video that showed people without masks partying indoors and had around 11,000 views. The TikTok account, whose activities were spotted by New York Times journalist Taylor Lorenz and later shared on Twitter, showed it promoting underground gatherings in New York City. As per the Vybe website, one had to first apply for attending such an underground party, and if they are approved by the host, the venue of the risky gathering would be shared two hours before the party started.
They’re currently in the midst of promoting secret NYE ragers in nyc pic.twitter.com/dEIdwX1DKn
— Taylor Lorenz (@TaylorLorenz) December 29, 2020
The motto of the Vybe platform? “Get your rebel on. Get your party on.” As for the Vybe Together app, it was reportedly listed on the App Store around four months ago, and was pulled down following an inquiry by BusinessInsider. However, Vybe Together CEO Alexandar Dimcevski has claimed the platform never hosted any large gathering and that the TikTok video in question was an “over-the-top marketing video.” Notably, Dimcevski appears to have taken down his LinkedIn profile, and the website has been pulled down too. You can view an archived version of the Vybe Together website here.
“Vybe’s can be anything from playing board games to bachata with your neighbors. A lot of people have been isolated and lonely and we wanted to enable them to meet. We are aware that large gatherings are not okay and we do not promote them. If we see events are popular we take them off,” a Vybe spokesperson was quoted as saying by BusinessInsider.
Notably, the platform itself acknowledged that large gatherings are a major health risk, which is why it only facilitates small gatherings. Irrespective of what the company says, bringing together a bunch of random strangers is a clear violation of health guidelines and a ticking COVID-19 infection bomb waiting to explode.
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Global app spending across Android and iOS exceeded $406 million on Christmas
It appears that this Christmas was a good one for developers and businesses (and Google and Apple as well, thanks to that sweet 30% fee), as the combined global app spending across the Android and iOS ecosystems crossed the $407 million mark for a single day in 2020. As per a Sensor Tower report, consumers spent a staggering $407.6 million across the Google Play Store and App Store on Christmas, which amounts to a significant 34.5% growth on a YoY basis compared to 2019.
“2020 has been a record-setting year for worldwide spending on mobile apps and games, which passed $100 billion in a single year for the first time ever in November,” the report adds. The single-day spending on mobile apps this Christmas accounted for 4.5% of the total spending this month as of December, which stands at an equally impressive $9 billion worldwide. Here are a few key observations from Sensor Tower’s analysis:
App Store handily surpassed Play Store
- Apple’s App Store again emerged as the more cash-rich platform. Apple’s repository captured 68.4% ($278.6 million) share of the Christmas day app spending, while Google’s Play Store could only reach $129 million.
- On a market basis, US was the biggest one. Smartphone users in the US spent a combined $130 million on Android and iOS apps this Christmas.
Mobile games were the top-grossing category
- Mobile games emerged as the leading category this holiday season, which brought in $295.6 million on Christmas this year. This is a 27% growth compared to 2019. Talking about the crown, Tencent’s Honor of Kings led the spendings chart by bringing in $10.7 million in a single day.
- Non-gaming apps raked in $112 million this Christmas, and the category that won here was entertainment. Consumer spending on entertainment apps reached $19.3 million this year on the App Store, while the Google Play Store amassed $4.3 million from these apps. TikTok emerged as the top grosser, with consumer spending touching the $4.7 million mark on Christmas day.
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Apple opens enrolment for developers seeking a 50% reduction in App Store fee
A couple of weeks ago, Apple announced a new initiative called App Store Small Business Program that saw Apple reduce the commission rate it charges for applications on App Store from 30% to 15%. Well, the company has now started the enrolment process for its program that aims to help developers and small businesses that earn less than a million per year from their apps. Apple started the program after taking into consideration that 2020 was a bad year for many in the App Store developers community.
“Enrollment is now open for the new App Store Small Business Program, designed to accelerate innovation and help propel your small business forward. Featuring a reduced commission rate of 15% on paid apps and in-app purchases, this program helps you invest more resources into your business so you can continue building great apps,” Apple notes.
Almost 98% of developers are expected to benefit
In order to qualify for the program, a developer shouldn’t have made more than 1 million dollars from all of their apps combined in the last 12 months throughout the 2020 fiscal year. Those who are deemed eligible will have to pay 15% commission for paid apps and in-app purchases to Apple, instead of the standard 30% fee.
In case a developer who qualifies for the 15% tax reduction makes more than $1 million in the subsequent fiscal year, the standard 30% App Store will be levied for the remainder of the year as soon as they touch that threshold. Additionally, developers whose earnings fall below the one million dollar mark in the future, they can again apply for the program and pay the lower 15% commission to Apple.
Developers can apply again if app proceeds falls below $1 million
If you’re a developer, Apple has set a deadline of December 18, 2020 for accepting applications towards the App Store Small Business Program, provided their proceeds are adjusted by 1st January next year. As per estimates by analytics firm Sensor Tower’s data, almost 98% of developers will qualify for the program since they account for only 5% of the App Store revenues.
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Pocketnow Daily: Apple CUTS 30% App Store Tax: Sorry Epic Games.. (video)
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Samsung Galaxy S20+, latest M1 13-inch MacBook Pro and more devices on sale
You already know how this goes so as per usual, let’s begin today’s show with deals. Starting off with the Samsung Galaxy S20+ which is $250 off, leaving the entry level variant for $950 shipped which is actually cheaper than what you would pay for the regular S20. The Galaxy Note 10+ is also $250 off, leaving the 256GB of storage variant for $850. The latest M1, 13in MacBook Pro is $49 off, that leaves the entry-level variant for $1250 and trust me, that thing is worth it. We also have discounts on Logitech Peripherals, like in the case of the G903 gaming mouse, which is $22 off, leaving it at $128 shipped. Finally, the Galaxy S10 Lite is $145 off, leaving that at $500 shipped. We have more deals on other Logitech products, Samsung Gaming monitors and more, in the links in the description.
OPPO Find X3 series to come with system-wide 10-bit color support
OPPO got on the spotlight yesterday thanks to their new concept smartphone and the other things we got at their INNO Day Conference. Well, Day 2 just happened in China and, they just confirmed that they are working on the Find X3 Series. Now, we don’t have much information on what we’re getting here but, one thing they did say is that we will be getting a native 10-bit display on this phone. OPPO says that they’re R&D team is preparing new algorithms in areas like distortion-correction, multi-frame noise reduction and extreme super-resolution. It will support Digital Overlap HDR mode. Check out the links in the description for other technical details they mentioned but, the Find X2 Pro already had probably my favorite display of the year, so we’re not going to complain about it getting better.
Google Pay app gets a redesign and some new features
Now let’s talk about Google as the company has just unveiled a revamp to their Google Pay app through a livestream today. Basically it delivers a complete redesign. It now shows you friends and family to which you can pay directly and nearby businesses that accept Google Pay as well in the top right corner. You also get other features like payment history at certain establishments as well as a new Explore Tab and a new Insights Tab. Google’s objective is for you to manage your money better with a budget feature in the Insights tab and they are also adding support for Plaid which lets you connect your bank or credit card. Another cool feature is letting you import pictures of receipts from Google Photos, that is if you’re still using it after the dilemma. There’s a ton of other features coming to the app so, check out the links below and FYI, the update is currently rolling out in the US to both Google Play and iOS.
Google offers an optimized version of Chrome for Macs with Apple’s M1 chip
Chrome gets a huge performance boost and a useful tab search tool
And since we started with Google, Let’s talk about Google Chrome as, the company is bringing some very interesting and welcome changes. Yesterday they announced v87, which is currently rolling out, and it gives Chrome its biggest boost in performance in years. You get upgrades like it opening 25% faster and page loading speed is going up by 7%, all while using less RAM and cutting down on the power consumption. They’re also adding other things like tab search, action buttons for better productivity and more. Something else we just got is an optimized version of Chrome for the new M1 Macs which we are testing as, the regular Chrome app quits pretty often if you’re not on the optimized version. Now, if you go to their website, you might not see the optimized one so if you’re rocking one, make sure to check out the link in our description to get it. So yeah, we hope Chrome works out all of their resource issues as they have been working on it for quite some time now.
Samsung might be working on a cheaper foldable phone called Galaxy Z Flip Lite
Samsung has really shifted their strategy towards foldables as of late and with those rumors of the Galaxy Note disappearing it makes a lot of sense. Well, a couple of days ago we covered a list of Samsung flagships that we should expect next year and a couple of them were cheaper foldables, one of them being a Z Fold FE and a a Z Flip Lite. Well, according to a new tweet from Ross Young, they are no longer hearing about a Z Fold Lite or FE anymore but apparently the Z Flip Lite is still on the table. What’s kind of impressive here is that Samsung will still be using their UTG technology on this phone, despite it being a cheaper device. This means that it won’t be as fragile as the original Galaxy Fold and it ensures some longevity. Of course this is still a rumor though, we are somewhat close to the Spring already which is when we got the original Z Flip. The thing about it is, we know that a lot of you guys are interested on foldables but the price tag is simply a deal breaker so, would you guys like a Z Flip Lite?
Story of the day:
Apple is halving its commission rate to 15% for most developers
And finally for the hottest news today, we have something that’s oddly for the ban section which Diego still hasn’t made graphics for. Well not really but, almost part of the ban section let’s move on to Apple. If you remember, the whole Apple vs Epic situation started because of Apple’s infamous 30% tax, which Epic Games wanted them to waive for customers to pay the actual value at which they sell their cosmetics. Well, you already know how that went but, it seems like Apple is doing something for smaller developers through their new “Small Business Program”. Cupertino just announced that they are lowering their commission to 15% but, it is strictly for developers that earned $1M or less in the previous calendar year. Apple mentions that this will benefit the vast majority of developers that sell digital goods and other services on the App Store, with this new Business Program launching on January 1st, 2021. They also said how small businesses are the backbone of the global economy and the beating heart of innovation and opportunity in communities around the world. For developers who surpass the $1M threshold, they will still get the 30% commission but, if somehow they fall below that $1M mark by the end of the year, they will be able to apply and get the 15% through the program. So, it looks like what Epic Games was doing did work, just not for them.
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