Apple has updated its App Review Guidelines to expand the list of user-generated content experiences that can be removed from the App Store without notice. Here are the details.
Bad news for anonymous chat apps
Apple’s App Review Guidelines have an entire section dedicated to Safety. One of its sub-sections deals with apps with user-generated content, which the company acknowledges “present particular challenges, ranging from intellectual property infringement to anonymous bullying”.
To mitigate these issues, Apple requires such apps to follow certain rules, including providing mechanisms to report offensive content, and filter objectionable material.
In addition to this, Apple explicitly lists several apps with user-generated content that may be removed from the App Store without notice. That list already included categories such as apps being used primarily for pornographic content, making physical threats, and objectifying real people.
Today, Apple added “random or anonymous chat” apps to the list. Here’s the full, updated segment, from section 1.2 User-Generated Content:
Apps with user-generated content or services that end up being used primarily for pornographic content, Chatroulette-style experiences, random or anonymous chat, objectification of real people (e.g. “hot-or-not” voting), making physical threats, or bullying do not belong on the App Store and may be removed without notice.
To read Apple’s updated App Review Guidelines, follow this link.
9to5Mac’s take
It is not immediately clear what led Apple to add this specific language to the App Review Guidelines today, considering that the previous version of the document already mentioned “Chatroulette-style experiences”.
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