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Android Google Privacy Programming Security Technology

Google Play Store App Rejections Up 55% From Last Year, App Suspensions Up 66% (zdnet.com) 23

In a year-in-review announcement today, Google said Play Store app rejections went up 55% last year after the OS maker tightened up its app review process. From a report: Similarly, stats for app suspensions also went up, by more than 66%, according to Google, which the company credited to its continued investment in "automated protections and human review processes that play critical roles in identifying and enforcing on bad apps." One of the most significant roles in the automated systems cited by Google in identifying malware is the Google Play Protect service, which is currently included by default with the official Play Store app. Google said this service now scans over 50 billion apps per day, and even goes as far as downloading and scanning every Android app it finds on the internet.

[...] Play Store's automated systems are now getting better and better at detecting threats, so much so that Google is now seeing clear patterns. "We find that over 80% of severe policy violations are conducted by repeat offenders and abusive developer networks," Ahn said. "When malicious developers are banned, they often create new accounts or buy developer accounts on the black market in order to come back to Google Play."

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Google Play Store App Rejections Up 55% From Last Year, App Suspensions Up 66%

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  • by ffkom ( 3519199 ) on Wednesday February 13, 2019 @05:19PM (#58118110)
    In comparison to the actually useful and thorough checks that are mandatory for an app to be published in the free open source repository https://f-droid.org/ [f-droid.org] Google is a shady shack of scam apps with few exceptions among the malware.
    • by tepples ( 727027 )

      Last I checked, someone looking for games on F-Droid would end up disappointed. What would need to change to encourage the development of original Android games distributed as free software?

      • by ffkom ( 3519199 )
        There are plenty of games on f-droid, I cannot comment on their quality though as I have no use for games on a smartphone - which neither has a display nor the sound or a controller I would consider usable for gaming. If I want to play video games, I sit down in front of my large 4k TV and start up a console.
        • by tepples ( 727027 )

          If I want to play video games, I sit down in front of my large 4k TV and start up a console.

          This works provided the game you want to try is made for the console you own. A developer may release a game on PC and Android first in order to build financial stability for a port to your console.

    • Yup. Damn near every single app available in the Play Store is malicious, mostly spyware.

    • by sad_ ( 7868 )

      and that is only possible because all the apps on fdroid are open source.
      if the app is not open, you run into problems as we see now with both stores on android and iphone.

      let that be a lesson for all those people who say more 'commercial' (read closed) software should be available for linux desktop.
      you don't really want that.

  • Useless statistics (Score:5, Insightful)

    by psnyder ( 1326089 ) on Wednesday February 13, 2019 @06:52PM (#58118572)

    app rejections went up 55%

    So from 20 to 31?

    app suspensions also went up, by more than 66%

    So from 3 to 5?

    We find that over 80% of severe policy violations are conducted by repeat offenders and abusive developer networks

    So they found 5 severe policy violations, then 4 of them did it again the next year?


    Of course it's probably more. But without actual numbers, statistics like these are useless.

    • by Luthair ( 847766 )

      So they found 5 severe policy violations, then 4 of them did it again the next year?

      Could be re-registering, it may also not be appropriate to give a death penalty to a publisher if they inadvertently pull in some shit via a library.

    • app suspensions also went up, by more than 66%

      So from 3 to 5?

      More like from 700,000 [slashdot.org] to about 1,150,000. Of course the real question is how long they stayed in the Play Store before being removed.

  • Not helping (Score:4, Funny)

    by duke_cheetah2003 ( 862933 ) on Wednesday February 13, 2019 @08:42PM (#58118988) Homepage

    It's still a cesspool of ad infected garbage.

    I can't even find a simple weather widget that doesn't start making my phone spew full screen ads at me randomly.

    Take your Play Store and shove it.

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