Apple says it has stopped over $9 billion in fraudulent App Store transactions over the past five years, with $2 billion of that blocked in 2024 alone.
In its annual App Store fraud report, Apple revealed that it:
- Identified 4.7 million stolen credit cards
- Blocked over 1.6 million accounts from making future purchases
- Rejected nearly 1.9 million apps that didn’t meet privacy and security rules out of 7.7 million submissions
The company also stopped hundreds of thousands of unsafe apps that could have harmed the App Store’s 813 million weekly users.
Cracking Down on App Scams
Here’s what Apple found and removed in 2024:
- 320,000 apps that copied existing ones or misled users
- Over 43,000 apps use hidden or undocumented features
- 17,000 apps caught using bait-and-switch tactics, where apps changed after approval to include risky content
- 400,000 apps rejected for violating user privacy
Fighting Fake Reviews and Fraud Accounts
Apple also removed:
- 143 million fake ratings and reviews
- Nearly 9,500 deceptive apps from search results
- Around 7,400 apps from the App Store’s charts
On the developer side:
- 146,000 developer accounts were shut down for suspicious activity
- 139,000 new developer sign-ups were rejected for trying to submit harmful apps
And on the user side:
- 711 million account creations were blocked over fraud concerns
- 146 million user accounts were deactivated for being tied to malicious behavior
Apple’s Message to Users
Apple recommends that users who notice anything suspicious with an app report it immediately at reportaproblem.apple.com. The company says its App Review team checks over 150,000 app submissions each week, helping more than 220,000 developers launch their apps safely each year.
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This year’s numbers mark an increase in fraud prevention efforts. In comparison, Apple blocked $1.8 billion in 2023 and $2 billion in 2022.
