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Apple Cracking Down on Sites Selling Access to iOS 6 Developer Betas

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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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Late last month, Wired covered the emergence of a cottage industry of businesses selling access to iOS developer betas prior to their official launch. Apple offers these developer betas to registered iOS developers. The fee for such a registration is $99/year. Some enterprising individuals have turned around and started selling their 100 possible device slots to users looking to install the iOS betas prior to their official launch.
Behind the scenes, each service uses the same simple backdoor: Registered iOS developers can activate up to 100 unique device IDs (or UDIDs) for their account, an essential tool for testing apps on multiple devices. Once registered with Apple, the activated device is also able to run pre-release versions of iOS, though developers are forbidden from sharing pre-release software outside their own team.

Ignoring these warnings, activation services charge a small fee to add a customer's device to their developer accounts. When they hit the 100-device limit, they just register a new account with Apple.
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This has been going on for a couple of years with no particular intervention from Apple. As Wired notes, it seems Apple just didn't seem to care, despite their wide availability.

ios6.jpg



That may have changed since the publication of the Wired article. MacStories has noted that many of the services listed in the original Wired article are no longer available. After reaching out to the sites, it seems that Apple has started taking action against these services.
While most of our emails bounced, we heard back from one of the site owners (who asked to remain anonymous), who confirmed his hosting provider took down the site after a complaint for copyright infringement by Apple. Similarly, the CEO of Fused tweeted in a reply to Andy Baio that Apple had been "fairly heavy-handed" with DMCA requests to UDID-selling sites hosted on their network.
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MacStories exchanged emails with the owner of one of the services which made $75,000 since the release of the iOS 6 Beta in June.

Article Link: Apple Cracking Down on Sites Selling Access to iOS 6 Developer Betas
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2012/07/08/apple-cracking-down-on-sites-selling-access-to-ios-6-developer-betas/
But i thought this was the most underwhelming upgrade and nobody liked it? :rolleyes:

It's about time they did this, too many people who don't have any idea what they're doing are getting their hands on Dev. Previews.
 
I wonder how much they charged to be added to their 100 device limit. Certainly not more than $100...
 
gregwyattjr said:
I wonder how much they charged to be added to their 100 device limit. Certainly not more than $100...
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Less than $10 per device is what Wired article said.

One site is selling it for $8.99 right now.

So figure $8.99 * 100 = $899 - $99 = $800 profit per apple dev registration.

arn
 
Why do we even need 100 slots? I'm using a total of 2. Large development companies might need about 20-50 tops for testing apps on the new OS.
 
Really!?

Well what does Apple expect, they promise a Fall launch date... and it's Summer. Get with the program Apple!
 
I too always wondered why they don't just cut back on how many slots they hand out. Or maybe offer different tiers. An independent developer only needs a few.
 
People would have gotten the developer accounts if the price isn't such a ripoff.
 
This is good news! Less people complaining about how their device doesn't work properly when they are using beta software.
 
gmanist1000 said:
This is good news! Less people complaining about how their device doesn't work properly when they are using beta software.
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All you need do is read the iOS6 section, and its obvious people are using beta as their casual daily driver, not as a development tool
 
The last two ios6 betas have not even checked udid, perhaps thats why they are going after them since you dont have to pay to activate your udid
 
I'm not a software pirate, but I checked out iMZDL. Sure enough, they got wiped out by Apple's DMCA complaints....
 
Last edited by a moderator:
jdkelly40 said:
Well what does Apple expect, they promise a Fall launch date... and it's Summer. Get with the program Apple!
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Get with the program and do what?

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kokhean said:
People would have gotten the developer accounts if the price isn't such a ripoff.
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In all seriousness, what is a ripoff? A $99 fee to develop products in a ready made market? Or is it something else?
 
kokhean said:
People would have gotten the developer accounts if the price isn't such a ripoff.
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^This.

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writingdevil said:
In all seriousness, what is a ripoff? A $99 fee to develop products in a ready made market? Or is it something else?
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Plus a commission for everything you sell. You shouldn't have to pay to get iOS 6 beta since it doesn't even make you any money.
 
faroZ06 said:
You shouldn't have to pay to get iOS 6 beta since it doesn't even make you any money.
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Having your app polished and ready to go the second iOS 6 is publicly available just might make you some money if you have a worthy app to sell.
 
faroZ06 said:
Plus a commission for everything you sell. You shouldn't have to pay to get iOS 6 beta since it doesn't even make you any money.
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But if it was free then there would be even more people who load up beta software on their phones and then complain when it doesn't work right.
 
I don't agree with people raking in the money from this, but without sharing I wouldn't be running iOS 6 right now. It's not hurting Apple because I'm not making money from it and I'll get the full release in the fall.
 
This is crazy! Apple should be really worried about people running iOS 6 without UDID Registration. My friend who doesn't sell slots gave a few to his friends for free. Apple banned his account accusing him of selling. Apple is just banning people left and right... it seems like to me they cannot tell.
 
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