Google has stopped 2.28 million defective apps from the Play Store by 2023. According to the company, the apps violated the app store’s policies. Google also blocked 333,000 malicious accounts because they tried to spread malware or because of multiple ‘serious policy violations’.
Another 200,000 app submissions were rejected or modified because they requested risky permissions. This concerns, for example, access to the background location or SMS content, Google said in an annual overview. The company also worked with SDK providers so that 31 SDKs collect or share as little sensitive data as possible.
The numbers are considerably higher than a year earlier. In 2022, Google banned 1.43 million apps from the Play Store and blocked 173,000 accounts. The company attributes the increase partly to tightened security policy and various measures taken in the past year. For example, VPN apps have been receiving a security label in the Play Store since November, with which Google wants to indicate that the VPN apps meet a security standard for mobile apps.
The Google Play SDK Index was also expanded, which contains SDKs used in approximately 6 million apps. According to Google, the index helps to ‘make better SDK choices, improve app quality and minimize integration risks’.
Tags: Google banned million bad apps Play Store Computer News
