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The article's premise does not make sense. This stuff happens despite the tight control, not because of it. If it was uncurated, it would be a cesspool like th

The article's premise does not make sense. This stuff happens despite the tight control, not because of it. If it was uncurated, it would be a cesspool like the Google play store (or ...shudder... the "competing" stores). Having a paid app that reads QR codes is not necessarily a scam. The article admits that 2/3 of the apps they reported were taken down. The article claims: "If consumers were to have access to alternative app stores or other methods of distributing software, Apple would be a lot more likely to take this problem more seriously" Yet then says: "Apple isn’t the only company that struggles with this issue: They’re also on Google’s Play Store, which is available on its Android mobile operating system. But unlike Apple, Google doesn’t claim that its Play Store is curated." ...so lack of competing stores or presence of (imperfect) curation is not the cause, because Google did not even begin to attempt to solve this problem. Play store apps, unless proven otherwise, are generally malware you carry with yourself every day, with potential access to everything in your device because the OS is nowhere near locked down compared to Apple counterpart. Hell, most Android devices ship with undeletable malware from vendors etc. Apple model is broken, but it is the least broken out there. Instead of admitting that, article tries to be a hit piece trying to make the Apple model look worse for the ongoing trial.

echelon 5y ago
Apple's model is the most broken out there. They've distorted our free market into "Apple's market". They tax ingress to 50% of Americans and don't let you establish a relationship with your customers. Beyond that, they make you dance through hoops to build and deploy software. It's a travesty that they won. If this continues, businesses will be paying Apple for customers brought to them by Apple iCar.
smoldesu 5y ago
> Apple model is broken, but it is the least broken out there. This would almost be true if users weren't forced to use the App Store to install native apps in the first place. If I had a choice to use a store like F-Droid on my iPhone, I wouldn't be complaining. However, being forced to use a broken system is still a complaint, even if it's marginally more secure than it's competitors.
- katbyte 5y ago
  Then go use android? apple isn't the only phone & store combo out there and allowing 2rd party app stores takes away a lot of the value prop - there is a reason i like having the non tech literate and susceptible to scams in my life use iphones. its not perfect but it's sure better than the play store.
  - smoldesu 5y ago
    That's a strawman. I'm not criticizing Android here, we're talking about Apple's responsibility to the consumer. As someone who owns several Apple devices, I can truly and honestly say that my life would be unequivocally better if I could install custom IPAs to my phone. Furthermore, Apple trusts the user to decide if Facebook can steal their data: why can't they trust the user to install third party apps? If they don't effectively communicate the danger beforehand, that's their failure. Otherwise, Apple is just locking off functionality to me, which is insulting considering I pay a premium for their devices that I expect to be recouped on the software side of things. That's their business model, if you don't like it then you should argue with them, not me.
    - judge2020 5y ago
      They don't trust their users to not install pirated apps. It's part of their revenue scheme - if you could install third party IPAs, you could download cracked versions of Apple Arcade apps or apps that bypass the in-app purchase system and don't give apple their 30% cut of digital content. It's the same reason Xbox and Sony restrict you to their stores, Apple's revenue model is just set up to extract more money overall instead of 99% on the backend like consoles do.
      - simondotau 5y ago
        Just to be clear about your argument, you’re saying that’s a bad thing? Is it wrong for a company to protect revenue—and remember 70% of revenue goes to the developer—from loss due to piracy? There are plenty of valid reasons to object to Apple’s revenue model, but the avoidance of piracy seems like a bridge too far.
Griffinsauce 5y ago
> Play store apps, unless proven otherwise, are generally malware you carry with yourself every day, with potential access to everything in your device because the OS is nowhere near locked down compared to Apple counterpart. I'm sorry but this is complete bullshit. Your data on Android appears to be about a decade old.
- echelon 5y ago
  Must. Defend. Apple. But seriously, Apple postures for control. They have a death grip on our industry, and it's up to the DOJ and legal system to rend it asunder. Apple does not deserve to have a singular App store with tight controls. It's not their right. And they've proven the sort of anticompetitive antics they choose to take when they have such power. Break them open.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- smoldesu 5y ago
  Exactly. By their same logic, Apple also ships all of their phones with malware since they are a third party who refuses security audits.
- TwoBit 5y ago
  > most Android devices ship with undeletable malware from vendors And how are those vendor app actually malware? Their presence can be annoying but they aren't malware.
  - MikeDelta 5y ago
    Also known as bloatware. Not malicious, just annoying.
- swiley 5y ago
  Both link to user hostile libraries like Facebook sdk. Both platforms push users toward app vendors that really don't care about their privacy.
mod50ack 5y ago
To be honest, there is not really competition to Google Play in its own niche, but within the FOSS sphere, stuff on F-Droid/IzzyOnDroid is on the whole almost always good quality.
TaupeRanger 5y ago
The article is arguing that the veneer of safety implied by Apple (above and beyond other stores) might make users more susceptible to fraud because they are more likely to believe the apps are all safe. They might be more cautious with other stores that don't offer that protection. Whether this leads to more actual cases of fraud would require a real study to be done.
- granzymes 5y ago
  The reason I disagree with this argument is that it boils down to "tons of scams are better than a few sophisticated scams because users are more wary." Users themselves have various levels of sophistication, and unsophisticated scams have plenty of victims.
  - smoldesu 5y ago
    The only reason I disagree with your disagreement is because Apple is making money here, and they have every incentive to turn the other cheek. Their entire business model is based on driving user interaction and spending, so I don't think they're the most trustworthy party to audit the App Store. That would be like if we let the President decide which news channels were allowed to broadcast at the beginning of their term.
    - granzymes 5y ago
      If we restrict Apple's incentives to be purely monetary, then we have to wonder if the reputational damage is less than their cut of users being scammed. I would argue that the reputational damage is worth more, strictly monetarily. Apple is an incredibly valuable brand, estimated in the hundereds of billions of dollars[0], and they are understandably protective of it. If <2% of the top 1000 apps are scams (from the article), and Apple periodically catches scams and helps unwind them (2/3rds of the apps the Post reported were removed), I don't think Apple is making all that much money here. Remember that Apple does't keep its 30% cut when a transaction is refunded. [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/264875/brand-value-of-the-25-most-valuable-brands/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/264875/brand-value-of-th...
gigatexal 5y ago
I guess they need to scale the team to meet the demand of apps. Adding headcount reduces profit but the benefit to brand image should compensate enough.
swiley 5y ago
>This stuff happens despite the tight control, not because of it. The question isn't weather or not happens, it's weather it's worth the enormous sacrifice of personal computing: No self hosting dev environments The dev environments you can find are pretty terrible (often in weird ways you don't notice until you've spent a day working around them.) Apple decides moderation rules for every chat service with push notifications on the platform. They kick you off the platform if you're not up to their standards. An extension to the last one is that Apple is able to (and does!) silence political ideas on the platform they don't like. They've gone as far as censoring Xscreensaver on iOS because they don't like the political thoughts people might have watching it. This is a major threat to democracy weather you currently agree with their positions or not. No innovation is allowed. Want to try a WIMP style GUI? Nope, Apple will kick you off. Even if you don't explicitly violate the rules odd looking GUIs are sometimes assumed to use private APIs and can result in a rejection. There are many (probably infinitely) more major sacrifices but I'm tired of listing them. > but it is the least broken out there. No! Debian and F-droid work extremely well, the difference here is that the community is maintaining the repo and they require everything be done out in the open.
zepto 5y ago
> The article's premise does not make sense. It does if you are Epic, or Jeff Bezos.
pranau 5y ago
> it would be a cesspool like the Google play store I would suggest you use an Android smartphone from the last 5 years before making a comment like this. I use both iOS and Android devices on a regular basis and both the App Store and Play Store are cesspools. I would go even further and say that the App Store is more obnoxious in that it serves me a half page ad whenever I search for an app. At least on Android, I have the choice to not use the Play Store. That is not even possible when I use iOS.
brianberns 5y ago
18 out of 1000 = “teeming with scams”? It’s a real problem, but the headline is sensationalized.
- swiley 5y ago
  When you're promised no scams and 1.8% of apps are scams (which is way higher if you search for niche things, especially stuff that isn't allowed) then yes that's "teeming with scams."
fragileone 5y ago
Competing app stores like F-Droid have far less scams that both the iOS and Google Play Stores.
veeti 5y ago
> Play store apps, unless proven otherwise, are generally malware you carry with yourself every day, with potential access to everything in your device because the OS is nowhere near locked down compared to Apple counterpart. Do you have a single fact to back this up, or did you just read it from Apple's marketing?
topkeks 5y ago
How to spot an icuck

echelon 5y ago

Apple's model is the most broken out there. They've distorted our free market into "Apple's market". They tax ingress to 50% of Americans and don't let you establish a relationship with your customers. Beyond that, they make you dance through hoops to build and deploy software. It's a travesty that they won. If this continues, businesses will be paying Apple for customers brought to them by Apple iCar.

smoldesu 5y ago

> Apple model is broken, but it is the least broken out there. This would almost be true if users weren't forced to use the App Store to install native apps in the first place. If I had a choice to use a store like F-Droid on my iPhone, I wouldn't be complaining. However, being forced to use a broken system is still a complaint, even if it's marginally more secure than it's competitors.

katbyte 5y ago
Then go use android? apple isn't the only phone & store combo out there and allowing 2rd party app stores takes away a lot of the value prop - there is a reason i like having the non tech literate and susceptible to scams in my life use iphones. its not perfect but it's sure better than the play store.
- smoldesu 5y ago
  That's a strawman. I'm not criticizing Android here, we're talking about Apple's responsibility to the consumer. As someone who owns several Apple devices, I can truly and honestly say that my life would be unequivocally better if I could install custom IPAs to my phone. Furthermore, Apple trusts the user to decide if Facebook can steal their data: why can't they trust the user to install third party apps? If they don't effectively communicate the danger beforehand, that's their failure. Otherwise, Apple is just locking off functionality to me, which is insulting considering I pay a premium for their devices that I expect to be recouped on the software side of things. That's their business model, if you don't like it then you should argue with them, not me.
  - judge2020 5y ago
    They don't trust their users to not install pirated apps. It's part of their revenue scheme - if you could install third party IPAs, you could download cracked versions of Apple Arcade apps or apps that bypass the in-app purchase system and don't give apple their 30% cut of digital content. It's the same reason Xbox and Sony restrict you to their stores, Apple's revenue model is just set up to extract more money overall instead of 99% on the backend like consoles do.
    - simondotau 5y ago
      Just to be clear about your argument, you’re saying that’s a bad thing? Is it wrong for a company to protect revenue—and remember 70% of revenue goes to the developer—from loss due to piracy? There are plenty of valid reasons to object to Apple’s revenue model, but the avoidance of piracy seems like a bridge too far.

Griffinsauce 5y ago

> Play store apps, unless proven otherwise, are generally malware you carry with yourself every day, with potential access to everything in your device because the OS is nowhere near locked down compared to Apple counterpart. I'm sorry but this is complete bullshit. Your data on Android appears to be about a decade old.

echelon 5y ago
Must. Defend. Apple. But seriously, Apple postures for control. They have a death grip on our industry, and it's up to the DOJ and legal system to rend it asunder. Apple does not deserve to have a singular App store with tight controls. It's not their right. And they've proven the sort of anticompetitive antics they choose to take when they have such power. Break them open.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
smoldesu 5y ago
Exactly. By their same logic, Apple also ships all of their phones with malware since they are a third party who refuses security audits.
TwoBit 5y ago
> most Android devices ship with undeletable malware from vendors And how are those vendor app actually malware? Their presence can be annoying but they aren't malware.
- MikeDelta 5y ago
  Also known as bloatware. Not malicious, just annoying.
swiley 5y ago
Both link to user hostile libraries like Facebook sdk. Both platforms push users toward app vendors that really don't care about their privacy.

mod50ack 5y ago

To be honest, there is not really competition to Google Play in its own niche, but within the FOSS sphere, stuff on F-Droid/IzzyOnDroid is on the whole almost always good quality.

TaupeRanger 5y ago

The article is arguing that the veneer of safety implied by Apple (above and beyond other stores) might make users more susceptible to fraud because they are more likely to believe the apps are all safe. They might be more cautious with other stores that don't offer that protection. Whether this leads to more actual cases of fraud would require a real study to be done.

granzymes 5y ago
The reason I disagree with this argument is that it boils down to "tons of scams are better than a few sophisticated scams because users are more wary." Users themselves have various levels of sophistication, and unsophisticated scams have plenty of victims.
- smoldesu 5y ago
  The only reason I disagree with your disagreement is because Apple is making money here, and they have every incentive to turn the other cheek. Their entire business model is based on driving user interaction and spending, so I don't think they're the most trustworthy party to audit the App Store. That would be like if we let the President decide which news channels were allowed to broadcast at the beginning of their term.
  - granzymes 5y ago
    If we restrict Apple's incentives to be purely monetary, then we have to wonder if the reputational damage is less than their cut of users being scammed. I would argue that the reputational damage is worth more, strictly monetarily. Apple is an incredibly valuable brand, estimated in the hundereds of billions of dollars[0], and they are understandably protective of it. If <2% of the top 1000 apps are scams (from the article), and Apple periodically catches scams and helps unwind them (2/3rds of the apps the Post reported were removed), I don't think Apple is making all that much money here. Remember that Apple does't keep its 30% cut when a transaction is refunded. [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/264875/brand-value-of-the-25-most-valuable-brands/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/264875/brand-value-of-th...

gigatexal 5y ago

I guess they need to scale the team to meet the demand of apps. Adding headcount reduces profit but the benefit to brand image should compensate enough.

swiley 5y ago

>This stuff happens despite the tight control, not because of it. The question isn't weather or not happens, it's weather it's worth the enormous sacrifice of personal computing: No self hosting dev environments The dev environments you can find are pretty terrible (often in weird ways you don't notice until you've spent a day working around them.) Apple decides moderation rules for every chat service with push notifications on the platform. They kick you off the platform if you're not up to their standards. An extension to the last one is that Apple is able to (and does!) silence political ideas on the platform they don't like. They've gone as far as censoring Xscreensaver on iOS because they don't like the political thoughts people might have watching it. This is a major threat to democracy weather you currently agree with their positions or not. No innovation is allowed. Want to try a WIMP style GUI? Nope, Apple will kick you off. Even if you don't explicitly violate the rules odd looking GUIs are sometimes assumed to use private APIs and can result in a rejection. There are many (probably infinitely) more major sacrifices but I'm tired of listing them. > but it is the least broken out there. No! Debian and F-droid work extremely well, the difference here is that the community is maintaining the repo and they require everything be done out in the open.

zepto 5y ago

> The article's premise does not make sense. It does if you are Epic, or Jeff Bezos.

pranau 5y ago

> it would be a cesspool like the Google play store I would suggest you use an Android smartphone from the last 5 years before making a comment like this. I use both iOS and Android devices on a regular basis and both the App Store and Play Store are cesspools. I would go even further and say that the App Store is more obnoxious in that it serves me a half page ad whenever I search for an app. At least on Android, I have the choice to not use the Play Store. That is not even possible when I use iOS.

brianberns 5y ago

18 out of 1000 = “teeming with scams”? It’s a real problem, but the headline is sensationalized.

swiley 5y ago
When you're promised no scams and 1.8% of apps are scams (which is way higher if you search for niche things, especially stuff that isn't allowed) then yes that's "teeming with scams."

fragileone 5y ago

Competing app stores like F-Droid have far less scams that both the iOS and Google Play Stores.

veeti 5y ago

> Play store apps, unless proven otherwise, are generally malware you carry with yourself every day, with potential access to everything in your device because the OS is nowhere near locked down compared to Apple counterpart. Do you have a single fact to back this up, or did you just read it from Apple's marketing?

topkeks 5y ago

How to spot an icuck