An app, recently removed from the App Store by Apple, was able to trick the App Store Review team to gain a listing in the iOS app storefront which it held for years. The developer employed the old ‘UI switcheroo’ technique. The app, titled “Collect Cards: Store box” appeared on the surface to be an app where an iPhone user might store and manage photos and videos. So far so good although we do note that the native Photos app and the Google Photos app are both outstanding on iOS.
The App Store listing for the app didn’t reveal much about it and the screenshots seemed to confirm that the app was designed to store users’ photos and videos. But the “Collect Cards: Store box” app had a secret dark side that helped it become the second most downloaded free app in the Brazilian version of the App Store. That alone should have set off some alarms inside Apple since you wouldn’t expect a rather plain-looking photo and video storage app to gain “must-have” status in one country.
Sure enough, the app would first determine the location of the user before fully loading. In the U.S., the app would load the basic UI of a photo and video storage app. In other regions, like in Brazil, the app was a pirate streaming service showing content from Disney+, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and HBO Max. To really rub salt in the wound, the app even displayed content from Apple TV+.
