Apple Highlights How the App Store Prevents Fraud Amid Legal Battle With Epic Games

[MacRumors]

Apple today announced that, through a combination of automated technologies and human review processes, the company protected customers from more than $1.5 billion in potentially fraudulent transactions in 2020.

Apple said secure payment technologies like Apple Pay and StoreKit (In-App Purchase) play an essential role in keeping users safe:

With online data breaches frustratingly common, these protections are an essential part of keeping users safe. But users may not realize that when their credit card information is breached or stolen from another source, fraudsters may turn to online marketplaces like the App Store to attempt to purchase digital goods and services that can be laundered or used for illicit purposes.

Apple focuses relentlessly on this kind of fraud as well. In 2020 alone, the fusion of sophisticated technology and human review prevented more than 3 million stolen cards from being used to purchase stolen goods and services, and banned nearly 1 million accounts from transacting again. In total, Apple protected users from more than $1.5 billion in potentially fraudulent transactions in 2020.

Apple shared a variety of additional statistics that aim to emphasize the security and privacy of the App Store, amid a high-profile trial with Fortnite creator Epic Games, which has described the App Store as a monopoly and anti-competitive. Apple said thanks to its "industry-leading antifraud efforts," the App Store is "the safest place to find and download apps," citing Nokia's 2020 Threat Intelligence Report.

Key Statistics

• In 2020, Apple protected customers from more than $1.5 billion in potentially fraudulent transactions.
• In 2020, nearly 1 million problematic new apps, and an additional nearly 1 million app updates, were rejected or removed from the App Store.
• In 2020, more than 48,000 apps were rejected for containing hidden or undocumented features, and more than 150,000 apps were rejected because they were found to be spam, copycats, or misleading to users.
• In 2020, about 95,000 apps were removed from the App Store for fraudulent violations, predominantly for bait-and-switch maneuvers.
• In 2020, over 215,000 apps were rejected for privacy violations.
• Apple terminated 470,000 developer accounts in 2020 and rejected an additional 205,000 developer enrollments over fraud concerns.
• In the last month, Apple blocked more than 3.2 million instances of apps distributed illicitly through the Apple Developer Enterprise Program.

Apple said its goal is always to get new apps onto the App Store, with the company's App Review team assisting more than 180,000 new developers in launching apps in 2020. In some cases, an app might be unfinished or not functioning properly when it's submitted for approval, or it might not yet have a sufficient mechanism for moderating user-generated content. In 2020, nearly one million problematic new apps, and an additional nearly one million app updates, were rejected or removed for a range of reasons like those, according to Apple.

A smaller but significant subset of these rejections were for more egregious violations that could harm users. In 2020, Apple said its App Review team rejected more than 48,000 apps for containing hidden or undocumented features, while more than 150,000 apps were rejected because they were found to be spam, copycats, or misleading to users in ways such as manipulating them into making a purchase.

Some developers perform a "bait and switch" by fundamentally changing how the app works after the review process to evade the App Store Review Guidelines, according to Apple. When such apps are discovered, Apple said they are rejected or removed immediately from the App Store, and developers are notified of a 14-day appeals process before their Apple Developer Program accounts are permanently terminated.

In 2020, about 95,000 apps were removed from the App Store for fraudulent violations, including bait-and-switch maneuvers, according to Apple.

Apple said it terminated 470,000 developer accounts in 2020, and rejected an additional 205,000 developer enrollments over fraud concerns. The company also deactivated 244 million customer accounts due to fraudulent and abusive activity.

As for App Store reviews and ratings, Apple said it relies on a combination of machine learning, artificial intelligence, and human review by expert teams to moderate these ratings and reviews to help ensure accuracy. Since 2020, Apple said it has processed over one billion ratings and over 100 million reviews, and over 250 million ratings and reviews were removed for not meeting moderation standards.

Apple said it also recently deployed new moderation tools to verify rating and review account authenticity, to analyze written reviews for signs of fraud, and to ensure that content from deactivated accounts is removed.

During its trial against Epic Games, Apple has argued that a single, curated App Store is necessary to protect the security, privacy, reliability, and quality that customers have come to expect from the company. Epic Games, meanwhile, has argued that Apple should allow third-party app stores and direct payment options on the iPhone and iPad.

Article Link: Apple Highlights How the App Store Prevents Fraud Amid Legal Battle With Epic Games

 

[GeoStructural]

No, it doesn't. Fraud still happens, and the App Store allows for knock-offs, apps loaded with trackers and malicious content. Reviews often focus on banal things like "embracing the notch" and Apple's financial interests (aka, securing their $$$ cut).

I know soon we will see Apple being forced to allow for alternative app stores and different payment methods, as it should be.

 

[Cosmosent]

From ALL the Stats, it does sound like Apple is doing something well WRT the App Store.

App Discovery, on the other hand, needs alot more work !

 

[Lemon Olive]

Apple said it terminated 470,000 developer accounts in 2020, and rejected an additional 205,000 developer enrollments over fraud concerns.

That's a lot. That's almost 1 developer account terminated per minute for all of 2020.

 

[I7guy]

Considering how many apps are in the app store and there is no way to lock down the app store completely without encumbering devs and users Apple does a pretty good job.

 

[TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️]

Apple is going to win! Give it up EPIC.

EPIC Fail battle.

 

[falainber]

Just $1.5B in "potentially fraudulent transactions in 2020"? That's an order of magnitude (or worse) less than the amount of money Apple charged iOS users for their "services". This indicates that humanity would definitely be better off without Apple services.

 

[now i see it]

Validating the belief that the AppStore is a cesspool. There's NO WAY they've caught every malware infested app/update when millions upon millions of crap apps are submitted each year. They catch some of them - but not all of them.
The flood of malware apps getting submitted to the AppStore will only increase as time goes on. Think it's bad now? We ain't seen nothin yet.
No wonder WWDC Is so popular. I wonder how many attendees have malware on their mind.

 

[I7guy]

Just $1.5B in "potentially fraudulent transactions in 2020"? That's an order of magnitude (or worse) less than the amount of money Apple charged iOS users for their "services". This indicates that humanity would definitely be better off without Apple services.

Seems to indicate that humanity is better off for their services. Glass half-empty or half-full, I guess.

 

[iRegi.P]

Better than nothing I guess ..

 

[applicious84]

Oh wow. I wonder how much Android users were defrauded and how that compares.

 

[munpip214]

The problem with all of these litigations is that no one ask the users or the small developers. Bring on the fraud!

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

That's a lot of numbers with no context. How does it compare against how well other stores are addressing fraud?

Apple needs to be justifying why their store should be the only store on iOS. They don't need to merely prove that they're doing something - I don't think I ever accused Apple of doing absolutely nothing - they need to prove that they're doing significantly more than anyone else is capable of. They need to prove that by permitting downloads to come from elsewhere, there'd be a substancial increase in fraud.

As is, tons of fraud still happens on the App Store. As Apple's own executives say, it's almost as if the review process doesn't exist there's so much junk that gets through.

===

Has anyone else noticed that MacRumor's coverage of this trial doesn't look like the coverage from anywhere else? Reading MR, you'd think that Apple is winning and Epic's lawyers are totally incompetent. Reading coverage from any mainstream newsite, you'd get the opposite impression.

 

[kognos]

Preventing fraud goes hand-in-hand with limiting choices.

It's moving the spotlight away from the market-restricting activities they do by preventing sideloading of applications. "We have a walled garden! Celebrate it, we're so pretty! (psst... Ignore the walls!)"

 

[mansplains]

From ALL the Stats, it does sound like Apple is doing something well WRT the App Store.

App Discovery, on the other hand, needs alot more work !

You don't like the main page suggesting the same apps, a majority of which are games, and highlighting repeat dev Q&As? Oh, and a lot of those games happen to be on Apple Arcade which has its own page entirely? I haven't downloaded a new app without searching or going to my purchases for a long time, the other pages are useless for finding new apps.

 

[I7guy]

That's a lot of numbers with no context. How does it compare against how well other stores are addressing fraud?

Apple needs to be justifying why their store should be the only store on iOS. They don't need to merely prove that they're doing something - I don't think I ever accused Apple of doing absolutely nothing - they need to prove that they're doing significantly more than anyone else is capable of. They need to prove that by permitting downloads to come from elsewhere, there'd be a substancial increase in fraud.

As is, tons of fraud still happens on the App Store. As Apple's own executives say, it's almost as if the review process doesn't exist there's so much junk that gets through.

===

Has anyone else noticed that MacRumor's coverage of this trial doesn't look like the coverage from anywhere else? Reading MR, you'd think that Apple is winning and Epic's lawyers are totally incompetent. Reading coverage from any mainstream newsite, you'd get the opposite impression.

I don't think Apple needs to justify why their store should be the only store on IOS. It's their platform, and while there is a legal challenge at hand, with Epic vs Apple, we don't know how it will turn out. It may turn out that Apple doesn't have to justify anything.

 

[Cosmosent]

It just hit me, the main problem with the App Store may simply be that Apple has too many NON-technical people in positions of influence !

 

[WiseAJ]

Has anyone else noticed that MacRumor's coverage of this trial doesn't look like the coverage from anywhere else? Reading MR, you'd think that Apple is winning and Epic's lawyers are totally incompetent. Reading coverage from any mainstream newsite, you'd get the opposite impression.

Where are you getting your coverage from? I haven't seen anything that paints any of what Epic is doing as competent. Epic is handing Apple this trial on a silver platter. All they have successfully seem to have done is waste everyone's time and money.

 

[Realityck]

I don't think Apple needs to justify why their store should be the only store on IOS. It's their platform, and while there is a legal challenge at hand, with Epic vs Apple, we don't know how it will turn out. It may turn out that Apple doesn't have to justify anything.

Epic hasn't done a great job showing consumers have been harmed going by various news media articles. If you develop a propriety OS, and you setup a software store for providing app's, and the consumer can always utilize a another OS with its own store, what's your argument Epic?

 

[easy4lif]

Epic hasn't done a great job showing consumers have been harmed going by various news media articles. If you develop a propriety OS, and you setup a software store for providing app's, and the consumer can always utilize a another OS with its own store, what's your argument Epic?

This lawsuit has never been about the user, it’s about epic wanting to create their own apple App Store where they can collect user data to sell for lots of $$$.

 

[ravenstar]

Has anyone else noticed that MacRumor's coverage of this trial doesn't look like the coverage from anywhere else? Reading MR, you'd think that Apple is winning and Epic's lawyers are totally incompetent. Reading coverage from any mainstream newsite, you'd get the opposite impression.

Well, yes, but I was thinking the opposite. MacRumors' coverage seems much more negative for Apple than the mainstream sources I've encountered. ABC News ran a story questioning whether Epic had any case at all. I guess it just matters which source you pick.

 

[Naraxus]

Well thank you Daddy Apple from protecting me from scam apps & fraud. Whatever would we have done before you came along to save us.

Oh wait......

 

[DeepWebinar]

What are these numbers even based on if there is no alternative in iOS to compare it to? Also, fraud still happens on the App Store, this website has reported on it before. It’s also not like other platforms are the wild west and Apple’s App Store has been the only digital storefront that has worked out stopping fraud and securing payments. This is a weak defense.

 

[JCoe13]

Well, yes, but I was thinking the opposite. MacRumors' coverage seems much more negative for Apple than the mainstream sources I've encountered. ABC News ran a story questioning whether Epic had any case at all. I guess it just matters which source you pick.

At the end of the day, every news source is going to have a bias. Your best bet at avoiding this is to always use several sources, which obviously is very cumbersome. Aside from these stories being reported, I actually think it's interesting to see how MacRumors can 'spin' a headline compared to other sources (and vis versa).

 

[ravenstar]

What are these numbers even based on if there is no alternative in iOS to compare it to? Also, fraud still happens on the App Store, this website has reported on it before. It’s also not like other platforms are the wild west and Apple’s App Store has been the only digital storefront that has worked out stopping fraud and securing payments. This is a weak defense.

Apple's point was that there is value in the effort it puts into the app store. It doesn't matter whether or not there's value in how other stores deal with fraud.

Is your point that stopping any fraud is valueless if it cannot all be stopped?