Apple Confirms Removing 25,000 Illegal Gambling Apps from App Store in China

Apple has taken a strong move against the illegal gambling apps spreading across the App Store in China. As the Chinese government has policy against such illegal apps, Apple taking action against about 25,000 apps.

According to The Wall Street Journal:

"Gambling apps are illegal and not allowed on the App Store in China," Apple said in a statement Monday. "We have already removed many apps and developers for trying to distribute illegal gambling apps on our App Store, and we are vigilant in our efforts to find these and stop them from being on the App Store."

Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said 25,000 apps have been removed as of Sunday—which would be less than two percent of the estimated 1.8 million apps on the App Store in the country—but Apple hasn't confirmed any numbers.

Earlier this month, Apple began to cracking down illegal gambling apps from the store and provided an explanation to the developer that “In order to reduce fraudulent activity on the App Store and comply with government requests to address illegal online gambling activity, we are no longer allowing gambling apps submitted by individual developers. The includes both real money gambling apps as well as apps that simulate a gambling experience.”

Further, Apple mentioned, “As a result, this app has been removed from the App Store. While you can no longer distribute gambling apps from this account, you may continue to submit and distribute other types of apps to the App Store.”

Apple did this last year as well in July and removed VPN apps from the App Store in China. And this time they are identifying illegal gambling apps and removing them.