A, overtime audit what ghost?

Sent by Apple Other-Other on 9 May 2020 at 10:06 a.m

Hello,

The review of your app is taking longer than expected. Once we have completed our review, we will notify you via Resolution Center.

If you would like to inquire about the status of this review, you may file a request via the Apple Developer Contact Us page.

Best regards,

App Store Review

Recently, many friends have been asking, “What is the reason for refusing”, “has anyone encountered this situation”. I just want to say: — Okay, I get it, you haven’t submitted a package in over a month.

Others – Others We are unable to continue reviewing this App because your Apple Developer Program account is currently under investigation for not following the Developer Code of Conduct set out in the App Store Review Guidelines. Common practices that may result in an investigation include, but are not limited to: – Misrepresenting the app or service – misleading app content – conducting fake ratings and review operations – providing misleading customer support responses – providing misleading responses at the resolution Center – participating in misleading purchases or bait and switch schemes – engaging in other dishonest or fraudulent activities both inside and outside the app during an investigation, We will not review any applications you submit. When the survey is completed, we will notify you through the solution center. At this time, we do not require any additional information from you, nor do we need to share any additional details. Thank you for your patience and cooperation during our investigation.

You’ve probably seen the infamous account survey template above. In fact, the initial rejection template is the new account survey. The new account survey will be implemented around May 9, 2020, and all account surveys since then have received the above reasons.

Why did Apple change its template? As far as I’m concerned.

  1. The old version of the account survey pointed out that “the account is under investigation”. In fact, there may be a problem with your bag, not necessarily with your account. Some developers may accuse Apple for this, saying that my account is ok and I applied for it myself, why did I investigate it again and again?
  2. The old account survey lists a few reasons why you might say I didn’t violate any of the above, and then go to Apple theory. Well, you don’t have to worry about what you’re violating, because I’m not saying you’re violating, I just need more time to review. — You went from angrily telling Apple that I had no problem to nodding and asking how your review was going? You say the apple is not tall.

Ii. Why will the new account investigation be triggered

Not to mention the new account survey, no one has fully figured out the old one yet. However, the following aspects can be considered:

1. The code has not been checked by machine

The value starting with “other-other” is basically a computer audit. The failure of the computer audit is largely due to the high similarity of the code, for example, you developed multiple apps and shared most of the code; Or maybe your own code is too small and open source libraries are too heavy.

2020.7.1 Update: Today, there are two netizens + me, by the new account investigation, especially coincidentally, the new account investigation results are exactly the same time, 10:43 am, a total of 6 minutes of audit. This is more evidence that my new version of the account survey is the machine audit of the conclusion!

2. Account problems, new account, associated account or black card account

There is a saying in the industry that a newly registered account must be investigated. Of course, this saying has not been verified, but it is possible. Linked account: multiple accounts registered with the same identity information, multiple accounts bound with the same mobile phone, or your account is bought. In short, for Apple, your account is very suspicious and should be investigated.

Update 2020.7.1: A netizen said that after his bag was investigated by his account, it was not long before he directly closed it without any notification email. Later, he said that his account was bought. Buy the account you do not know how the seller is paying, may be a black credit card payment. Now than a few years ago, buy numbers need to be careful.

3. There is a problem with your App metadata

App name, icon, keyword. For more on the influence of names and ICONS, see my article how I Cried 4.1+4.3, an Apple Review experience. Keywords also matter, such as those containing words such as gambling. Not long ago, there was a developer’s regular App. When updating the version, he added the ASO optimization word bought by a certain channel, which was mixed with some gambling words. He used it directly without paying attention to it. At the very least, this example shows that Apple audited the metadata, and it is possible that the metadata led to the account investigation.

Third, the experience of the landlord

Why are you so sure that the new account survey was conducted on or around May 9, 2020? Because I happened to witness the change 😂. At the beginning of January 2020, the author updated an online package and the result was investigated by the account (old version). The update has been very smooth before, why did the account investigation this time?

I analyzed the audit track of the account survey:

  1. Submit audit for 5-10 minutes, start machine trial (don’t assume that machine trial is only a static scan code, machine trial will start your App and simulate user actions), basically all the TabBar button again, and even user agreement will point, login page also triggered, there is a phenomenon is machine whose basically not into the secondary pages, click basically stay on the surface.

  2. 0-2 PM that night or 5-8 am the next morning to enter the “in Review “state, a few minutes later, was rejected, account investigation. There was no audit trail.

There is no other audit track except the record of the machine audit, so I can be sure that my App must have failed the machine audit. Why was it rejected only at night? I have two guesses: 1. The machine first marks the conclusion, the manual delivery of judgment. 2. There is no human participation in the whole process. After you bring up the case, the machine will prejudge the case.

The owner of the building is not reconciled and wants to find out the reason why the account is investigated. Since the version of my App submitted for several times has not been checked, it is largely due to the code problem. Can’t I roll back the code to the last approved version submission to determine if it’s a problem with the newly modified code? And I did!

  • In the morning of August 8, 2020.I was investigated by (old version) account
  • In the afternoon of August 8, 2020.the code was rolled back to the latest reviewed version and submitted for review
  • In the morning of September 20, 2020, I received the rejection of the overtime review at the beginning of the article

I was so excited when I received the new rejection reasons! Because I have not been investigated by account, it seems that I can confirm that there is something wrong with my updated code! Later I removed the code that I thought was suspicious and submitted it is still the reason for rejection. At that time, I was also a little confused, went to the development exchange group to take a look, found that there are many people encountered this “new” rejection reason. Is it just a different template for the account survey? Therefore, I paid attention to it and found that no one had received the old account survey since May 9, but some people had received this new reason for rejection. Now you can be sure that the reason for the rejection at the beginning of the article is the new account survey, but a new template.

We waited for 9 days for the investigation of the old version account, but the result was not available on the fourth day after I urged Apple. I feel urging must be useful, besides, the new account survey clearly tells Us to go to “Contact Us”. So, the second time I came across the new survey I pressed apple on “Contact Us” the same day.

  • In the morning of May 12, the second new account survey. DFT urged apple that day
  • On The night of May 13, I received an email from Apple’s customer service saying that the audit had not started yet, so we had to wait
  • 5.15 Dawn, 10 minutes of audit, audit passed

Although the above customer service said let me continue to wait, but the results on the third day, I personally feel urging Apple or have an effect.

Updated on July 24:

Some time ago, there were two users are the new version of the account after the investigation of apple direct 14 days of closure, make people panic, the owner thought that Apple’s policy has changed, urging apple closure has become a common phenomenon? These days, the owner of the building updated a version of the package, and as expected, the new account was investigated again. I urged Apple with apprehension, but it was not blocked at last, and the investigation result was a normal rejection. At the same time, there are also netizens feedback that he urged Apple also out of the investigation results, no closure. Therefore, the new investigation urging apple to be banned is not a common phenomenon, if your bag is no problem, the account is no problem, the urge!

Here is my experience with the update:

  • Submitted for review at 17:47, July 17
  • July 18 00:51 Other new account survey (audit 3 minutes), urge Apple that day
  • I received an email from customer service saying that the internal team had been contacted
  • The investigation ended at 00:09 on July 23, and the App automatically entered the status of “being reviewed” from the status of “rejected”
  • “Under review” lasted all day
  • Review ended, General business rejection -> Fix the problem and resubmit a version
  • Approved at 01:09 on July 26

The account was investigated for 6 days and audited for 1 day. Three points are worth mentioning.

1. Further prove that “overtime audit” is “new account survey”

On the night of July 23, I received a message from Apple, and the App automatically changed from the “rejected” state to the “under review” state. The message from Apple is shown below

As you can see in the picture, Apple clearly stated that “the account investigation is over”. In fact, when I was rejected, I received the reason “more time is needed for the review”, not the account investigation, which further confirms my previous suspicion that “additional audit” is the “new account investigation”!

2. “In process of review” is not over all day, so don’t panic, you may encounter a manual triggered audit

On July 23, the owner of the App changed into “under review”, until 10 am not out of the results, the owner of the building panic a batch, thought over, not 14 days! We analyzed the audit trail last night, and we found something odd. The audit track is only the first page and TabBar, no statistics of the details page, so familiar with the situation — is it computer audit? General artificial audit will be first machine review again, machine review results assist their judgment, is yesterday audit personnel too busy, did not bother to come, first run a machine review, the second day again manual audit? Later, the next night, I audited my App and got the result. I compared the audit track, and found that the audit track is very “normal”, each page is clicked, there are details of the page statistics. And then confirmed that the first night was indeed a machine audit. So, don’t panic when your App is “being reviewed” all day, you may be experiencing a human-triggered review! At the back into the manual audit.

3. Resubmit a version immediately after the investigation without being investigated by the account

The owner of the building has published the survey results twice before, and once it was approved. As a result, the updated version was investigated by the account again next time. The owner of the building once thought that his bag must be investigated every time. Surprised but confused, why did not investigate this time? I have two guesses:

  • Apple may have a short-term trust mechanism. The package submitted repeatedly in a short period of time will be regarded as a fixed version of the last rejected, and will be directly submitted to the person who reviewed the last time. This process may skip the account review stage; If the next updated version is submitted ten days and a half months later, the short-term trust is invalid, and the review process will start again, and it may be investigated again, and the review person may not be the same as last time.
  • Whitelist of accounts. Maybe apple will add me to the whitelist after this account investigation, and there will be no account investigation in the future.

Iv. How to deal with the new account investigation

Since the new version of the account investigation is only a new template, you can refer to the second paragraph of the article for the reason of the account investigation. Not to say that some developers will be the account investigation, there are also many developers audit is very smooth, due to the strengthening of apple audit, would rather kill a thousand wrong also can not let go of a, is bound to accidentally hurt a lot of developers, there is no good way to avoid.

1. Account investigation shall be handled according to the situation

If you encounter the new account survey, my advice is:

  • If your App does work and your associated account (i.e. one registered with the same id or phone number) has not been blocked, you can contact Apple for review “on the same day” your account is investigated. Yes, that’s the day! Because I found out that if you don’t push Apple, apple won’t review you. The owner of a package investigation 17 days without results. On the contrary, the result will come out in a few days after you have pressed Apple before, and the result time depends on when you Contact Us, not how long you wait!
  • If there is something wrong with your App, or your account has been investigated and closed, please do not urge Apple again, because you have been added to the blacklist, and the result of urging Apple again is most likely to be closed in 14 days! Two users have already suffered the same fate: their first account was suspended for unknown reasons; Their related account was investigated, urged Apple, immediately closed 14 days.

2. Process of account investigation to urge Apple:

(1) Contact Apple through “Contact Us”. DFT = DFT = http://dft = DFT = http://dFT = http://dFT = http://dFT = http://dFT = http://dFT = http://dFT = http://dFT The content of the letter probably means that there is no problem with your App, please apple review as soon as possible, language organization depends on your ability, the more touching the heart, apple customer service is more likely to help you deal with [dog head], you can directly write Chinese. Contacting Apple in Contact Us is like contacting Apple customer service (not the audit team), you will receive “Thank you for contacting App Store Review” confirmation email from [email protected].. Apple has received your request on behalf of you. (2) In one to three days, you will receive a reply email from apple’s customer service “[email protected]”, which may ask you to continue to wait, or may help you contact the audit staff of the internal team. The longer the investigation of your account takes, the more likely the customer service will give you feedback. If the customer service just let you continue to wait, did not say to help you contact the internal audit staff, also do not lose heart, although she said so, but maybe a few days to give you the audit, the owner of the building experienced once, the audit staff let me wait, the results of 3 days later. Of course, you can wait a while and ask again. (3) after receiving the customer service email, basically will enter the manual audit, the probability is the second day of the survey results received the customer service email.

Q&A

1. How long will the investigation of the new account take?

Generally 3-7 days or so is normal, more than 10 days is not normal. Some netizens also reacted to the investigation on the same day and the results came out on the second day. Therefore, encounter the new account survey can wait 3 days to see. If apple is not pressed, the results of the investigation are expected to be released in three months. After urging apple generally 4-7 days can give results.

2. The new account has been approved after investigation, will it be transferred to the investigation later?

Even if the account survey passes, the next update may still be investigated by the account. Every update will still be investigated after the previous survey is passed. However, after the latest investigation results, the owner of the building immediately fixed the problem and submitted a package, surprisingly, was not investigated, directly through!

3. How to judge the machine audit?

(1) “other-other” is basically computer audit. (2) Machine audit will not click into the details page. After analyzing the audit track of the night of multiple account surveys, I found that all pageView statistics were superficial: “auditors” only clicked the TabBar button, not entered the details page, which was very rare, if any. If it is normal manual audit, he can not point into the second page to see.

4. Why is it all of a sudden investigated after updating several versions without any problem?

(1) Apple. For example, if you update the version after apple updates its auditing mechanism at some point, new rules may be triggered. New rules, either at the code level or at the account level. (2) Your reasons. You change the code, or you change the metadata, add changes that might trigger an account investigation.

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