Mobile

Google banned 173k developer accounts in 2022

In 2022, Google prevented 1.43 million policy-violating apps from being published in the official Google Play store.

Google announced that it prevented 1.43 million policy-violating applications from being published on Google Play in 2022. The IT giant also announced it has banned 173k developer accounts and prevented over $2 billion in fraudulent and abusive transactions.

Google announced that its successes are the results of improved security features and policy enhancements in combination with its continuous investments in machine learning systems and app review processes.

The company says it has prevented about 500K submitted apps from unnecessarily accessing sensitive permissions over the past 3 years.

“We’ve raised the bar for new developers to join the Play ecosystem with phone, email, and other identity verification methods, which contributed to a reduction in accounts used to publish violative apps.” states the report published by Google. “As the Android ecosystem expands, it’s critical for us to work closely with the developer community to ensure they have the tools, knowledge, and support to build secure and trustworthy apps that respect user data security and privacy.”

The company explained that in 2022, the App Security Improvements program helped developers to address approximately 500K security weaknesses affecting approximately 300K apps.

Google is working with SDK providers to ensure the safety of SDKs used by app developers. The company also launched the Google Play SDK Index to evaluate the reliability and safety of SDKs.

The tech giant is also working to fight fraudulent and malicious ads on the official Play Store. It updated its ads policy for developers to provide key guidelines that will improve the in-app user experience and prohibit unexpected full screen interstitial ads.

The Data Safety section in Google Play obliges developers to declare how their app data is being collected, shared, and protected.

“We remain committed to keeping Google Play and our ecosystem of users and developers safe, and we look forward to many exciting security and safety announcements in 2023.” concludes the company.

Blogger Awards 2022 – VOTE FOR YOUR WINNERS
Vote for me in the sections:

  • The Teacher – Most Educational Blog
  • The Entertainer – Most Entertaining Blog
  • The Tech Whizz – Best Technical Blog
  • Best Social Media Account to Follow (@securityaffairs)

Please nominate Security Affairs as your favorite blog.

Nominate here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfaFMkrMlrLhOBsRPKdv56Y4HgC88Bcji4V7OCxCm_OmyPoLw/viewform

Follow me on Twitter: @securityaffairs and Facebook and Mastodon

Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, Android)

Pierluigi Paganini

Pierluigi Paganini is member of the ENISA (European Union Agency for Network and Information Security) Threat Landscape Stakeholder Group and Cyber G7 Group, he is also a Security Evangelist, Security Analyst and Freelance Writer. Editor-in-Chief at "Cyber Defense Magazine", Pierluigi is a cyber security expert with over 20 years experience in the field, he is Certified Ethical Hacker at EC Council in London. The passion for writing and a strong belief that security is founded on sharing and awareness led Pierluigi to find the security blog "Security Affairs" recently named a Top National Security Resource for US. Pierluigi is a member of the "The Hacker News" team and he is a writer for some major publications in the field such as Cyber War Zone, ICTTF, Infosec Island, Infosec Institute, The Hacker News Magazine and for many other Security magazines. Author of the Books "The Deep Dark Web" and “Digital Virtual Currency and Bitcoin”.

Recent Posts

CISA adds Microsoft Windows Print Spooler flaw to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog

U.S. CISA added the Windows Print Spooler flaw CVE-2022-38028 to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog.…

30 seconds ago

DOJ arrested the founders of crypto mixer Samourai for facilitating $2 Billion in illegal transactions

The U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) announced the arrest of two co-founders of a cryptocurrency mixer…

23 mins ago

Google fixed critical Chrome vulnerability CVE-2024-4058

Google addressed a critical Chrome vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2024-4058, that resides in the ANGLE graphics…

5 hours ago

Nation-state actors exploited two zero-days in ASA and FTD firewalls to breach government networks

Nation-state actor UAT4356 has been exploiting two zero-days in ASA and FTD firewalls since November…

17 hours ago

Hackers hijacked the eScan Antivirus update mechanism in malware campaign

A malware campaign has been exploiting the updating mechanism of the eScan antivirus to distribute…

24 hours ago

US offers a $10 million reward for information on four Iranian nationals

The Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned four Iranian nationals for their…

1 day ago

This website uses cookies.