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Apple Officially Bans Scammy Antivirus Apps From iOS App Store (theverge.com)
Fake "virus scanning" apps have plagued the iOS App Store for a while, and Apple seems to finally be banning them once and for all in updated developer guidelines it published last week. From a report: The updated developer guidelines, compiled by Paul Hudson over at Hacking With Swift, now includes a ban on apps that claim to "including content or services that it does not actually offer" -- something that includes any iOS virus scanning apps, seeing as it wasn't possible to scan for viruses on iOS with third party apps, since iOS's sandboxing prevents applications from directly interacting with each other or the core of the iOS operating system.
Because of 30% of every sale.
Apple does not sell eBooks.
The authors of eBooks sell eBooks, using Apples and Amazons and other platforms.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Fraud can be notoriously difficult to litigate. For instance, a bunch of antivirus apps on iOS would allow you to open an attachment in the app (say, a PDF), and it would scan the file. While it couldn't do more than that, it would likely survive a fraud accusation unless the vendor description was extravagantly inaccurate.
Apple hasn't historically checked if an application was fit for the purpose - they didn't evaluate if a product was a good one. They were interested in things like:
- Does it replicate built-in functions?
- Is it buggy?
- Does it contain malware?
- Does it conform to application UI design standards?
The criteria by which they review an application mostly closes the door on the question of fraud. This is in the grey area, and so they're finally addressing it.