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Microsoft has announced that it is starting to crack down on misleading apps in the Windows Phone store after the company had received reports that there were scam/fake apps up for grabs, asking users to pay for content and functionality that can typically be found for free.
Windows Apps and Store General Manager, Todd Brix, made a blog post, detailing Microsoft's plan going forward, which includes enforcing stricter policies. From now on, all app icons must be differentiated in order to avoid being mistaken with others, apps must be categorized correctly and the name must clearly reflect the functionality of the app.
In addition, Microsoft is conducting a full review of the Windows Phone app store, in an effort to identify the bad eggs and ensure that every app complies with the store's new policies. Due to unresponsive developers, as many as 1500 apps have been forcefully removed so far:
“Most of the developers behind apps that are found to violate our policies have good intentions and agree to make the necessary changes when notified. Others have been less receptive, causing us to remove more than 1,500 apps as part of this review so far.”
“The Store review is ongoing and we recognize that we have more work to do, but we’re on it. We’re applying additional resources to speed up the review process and identify more problem apps faster.”
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KitGuru Says: The Windows Phone store should be a much friendlier place now that this full catalog review is in effect in conjunction with the stricter app policies. How many of you guys own a Windows Phone? Are you glad that Microsoft is cleaning up the store?
Source: Windows Blog
I’ve got a lumia 610. It wasn’t cheap and it doesn’t run a lot of apps. My mom’s xperia E cost less than half and runs everything you can throw at it. I don’t know if I should blame microsoft or nokia though.
I just upgraded to the Lumia 630 from the 800. Best phone I’ve ever had and it cost around £100. Cheap and brilliant 🙂
I own a Windows Phone myself, and I am happy that these guys wil be looking into these bad apps. @LinusTechTips was mentioning in their last WAN Show about the number of ‘devs’ that create an app with a link to something and post that as an app. MS also pays devs $100 up to 20 times for each app they make as incentive to get apps on the Store. More of an incentive to get money by making a cheap app that does nothing but relay you to another site. I’m not happy with this. .. Too this is more my personal summary, so I recommend looking this up for yourself once you get the chance, and do correct me if I’m mistaken 😉
1500 removed? isn’t that like the entire app store?
I hate Microsoft but I would like their software to thrive….