Multiple reviews this week claimed Google had quietly rolled out a better app review technique to all builders — adjustments designed to maintain the Play Store more secure from junk mail, malware and copycat apps. Those reports are misguided, Google tells TechCrunch. Instead, the organization is giving itself extra time to study apps from new, unestablished developers on the Play Store, as previously introduced, but this hasn’t been extended to all builders.
Concerns approximately those so-known as “unannounced adjustments” stemmed from a blog post by Choice of Games, which wrote that “all new apps” could be getting an extra overview, slowing down app approvals. It claimed new apps might require as a minimum 3 days for assessment, and this now covered present builders.
The submit noted a conversation with Google Support as the supply for its claims.
This led to a ton of misunderstanding, because the development shop at the back of the publish was properly-mounted, having been at the Play Store seeing that 2010 and might had been exempt from Google’s coverage of expanded evaluations for brand new developers.
As it turns out, it seems there was miscommunication among Google Play Store developer support and the developer, in keeping with the chat transcript that changed into posted. The help person, “Liz,” changed into alerting the developer to the new coverage Google announced in April, which targeted expanded evaluate instances for Play Store beginners. She didn’t seem to keep in mind that she turned into speaking with a developer who had posted on Google Play for almost a decade.
Android Police also picked up the information, writing that Google had “quietly instigated a greater worried review method that affects each app and update.”
Reddit and Hacker News additionally weighed in. In addition to the suggested modifications, builders have been worried there has been now no way to schedule new app releases thru the Timed Publishing feature. (That’s also not authentic — developers can submit to a closed checking out music, then use Timed Publishing to head live to the general public.)
A Google Developer Relations group member stepped in to clear things up on Reddit, and we’ve confirmed with Google that his responses were correct.
Google’s updated app assessment technique, first introduced in April, hasn’t changed.
At the time, Google stated:
“We will quickly be taking greater time (days, not weeks) to review apps through builders that don’t yet have a song document with us. This will permit us to do extra thorough exams earlier than approving apps to move stay in the store and will assist us make even fewer faulty choices on developer bills.”
Google started notifying developers directly in the Play Console in June that new apps with the aid of developers with out a tune report will take multiple days longer to study. Google says that, given that this variation, it’s already seen a meaningful increase within the quantity of dangerous apps blocked via Play even before they’re posted.
It’s not clear why the developer relations support person miscommunicated this facts to the developer in question, but it points to a schooling trouble on Google’s component.
It’s additionally unclear why the hooked up developer’s app become held up in app overview, beyond it just being a mistake on Google’s component.
Unfortunately for Google, Play Store builders have come to count on a fast review system, so any delays sense like unnecessary friction.
Unlike Apple, which employs a large team to cautiously overview app submissions and make hard calls on debatable apps, Google has greater closely depended on automation over time. The enterprise disclosed in the past how it makes use of software to pre-analyze apps for viruses, malware and other content material and copyright violations.