The App Store stopped over $2.2 billion in fraudulent transactions in 2025 - Apple

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UPDATE

May 20, 2026

The App Store stopped over $2.2 billion in potentially fraudulent transactions in 2025

Leveraging human review and artificial intelligence to combat malicious activity, Apple rejected over 2 million problematic app submissions and blocked more than 1.1 billion fraudulent account creations in 2025

The App Store was built on two core principles: provide users with a secure, trusted place to discover apps, and offer developers a vibrant marketplace to grow their businesses.

Delivering on these principles requires vigilance and dedication. As the digital landscape expands, malicious actors continue to evolve their methods, often using deceptive tactics to target consumers and legitimate businesses. To outpace these challenges, Apple continuously improves its multilayered defenses, leveraging a combination of expert human review and advanced machine learning technologies to detect and stop malicious activity.

In 2025, Apple prevented over $2.2 billion in potentially fraudulent transactions, adding to a total of more than $11.2 billion over the past six years. Apple also took a number of actions to block bad actors from distributing malicious software, rejecting over 2 million problematic app submissions last year alone.

Apple’s protections not only prevent harm to users, but also allow developers to thrive in a global marketplace. Today, the App Store is a global destination that welcomes over 850 million weekly visitors across 175 storefronts.

Account Fraud

Over the years, bad actors have evolved their methods to defraud users, leveraging tactics such as implementing bot networks to create fake accounts, spam users, manipulate charts, or generate fake reviews.

In 2025, Apple’s Trust and Safety teams stopped multiple large-scale attempts to create fraudulent accounts. Last year, Apple’s systems also successfully rejected 1.1 billion fraudulent customer account creations — blocking bad actors at the outset — and deactivated an additional 40.4 million customer accounts for fraud and abuse.

Apple also takes decisive action to prevent malicious developers from entering the ecosystem, helping to ensure legitimate creators aren’t competing against fraudulent actors. In 2025, Apple terminated 193,000 developer accounts over fraud concerns and rejected more than 138,000 developer enrollments.

To further protect users from harmful software, Apple in 2025 detected and blocked 28,000 illegitimate apps on pirate storefronts, which include malware, pornography apps, gambling apps, and pirated versions of legitimate apps from the App Store. By restricting these storefronts and illicit distribution channels, Apple also protects developers from having their apps cloned, altered, or weaponized for spreading malicious software.

In the last month alone, Apple has also prevented 2.9 million attempts to install or launch apps distributed illicitly outside the App Store or approved alternative app marketplaces.

App Review

As powerful AI development tools drive a surge in app submissions, Apple’s App Review process has seamlessly scaled to handle the volume and to help ensure every new app and app update meets the App Store’s high standards for privacy, security, and quality.

In 2025, the App Review team evaluated more than 9.1 million app submissions, helping to welcome over 306,000 new developers to the platform. In addition, the team rejected over 2 million app submissions — including over 1.2 million new apps and nearly 800,000 app updates — for failing to adhere to the App Review Guidelines.

Apple’s App Review has always combined human expertise with machine learning, and that system continues to evolve. Today, a multilayered approach helps reviewers analyze submissions at scale, identify complex malicious patterns, and flag potentially fraudulent apps with greater speed and accuracy.

This compounding investment in advanced systems does more than just catch bad actors — it makes the entire curation process more efficient. By utilizing AI to rapidly identify complex malicious patterns, analyze app similarity, and flag potentially problematic changes in app updates, Apple’s systems help human reviewers focus their expertise where it matters most. This not only improves the customer experience by ensuring a high-quality, curated storefront, it also helps legitimate developers get their great apps and updates to users faster.

As deceptive tactics increase in complexity, App Review remains highly vigilant in catching problematic apps. This includes apps that were initially approved as standard games or utilities, such as a puzzle or calculator app, that then modified their software post-review with the intent of financial fraud. In 2025, the team removed nearly 59,000 apps for engaging in such bait-and-switch maneuvers.

Apple also rejected over 22,000 submissions for containing hidden or...