Taking major action, Google has removed more than 22 lakh apps from the Play Store. Apart from this, Google has also taken action against more than 3 lakh developer accounts. Last year, Google had made a major change in the policy of Play Store to improve the security and privacy of users. This is the biggest action taken by Google so far after updating the policy. Google found that malware and policy violations were being committed repeatedly from these developer accounts.
More than 22 lakh apps banned
Google said through its blog post that 2.28 million i.e. more than 22.8 lakh apps have been banned. Through these apps, incidents like malware and online scams were being done to the users. Not only this, Google has also suspended 3.33 lakh developer accounts that published these apps. Additionally, Google has also rejected 2 lakh app submissions. Google suspects that through these apps, sensitive information like background location tracking, SMS access and contact tracking was being stolen from users’ smartphones.
Apart from this, Google has also filed a lawsuit against two app developers in the US Federal Court. There are many allegations against these app developers of cheating users through fraudulent investments and crypto exchanges. The company said in its blog that these developers have cheated users by taking advantage of the loophole in the app acceptance process. Google said that the action taken against these app developers and apps is an example of a policy that provides better protection to users.
Strict steps for user safety
Google said that its aim is to provide better security to the users. Apps that require account creation will now have to allow users to delete data from within the app. Apart from this, this feature should also be added to the data safety section of Google Play Store. Google also said that it has restructured the App Defense Alliance (ADA). For this, it has partnered with Microsoft and committee members of Meta. The company has said that this partnership is to improve the best practices and guidelines of app security.