Spotlight on penalties for shady apps

A TECHNICAL INSPECTION of 55 smartphone apps, launched by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology during the second quarter of this year, found that 42 of them were illegally collecting users' information, promoting third-party apps and charging users for no good reason. Yanzhao Metropolis Daily commented on Wednesday:

If we are to rein in the shady business, it is not enough to simply expose the malicious smartphone apps and warn people to delete them. Effective supervision, institutional and technical, is needed to root out these pernicious apps.

On their part, app stores are obliged to not just screen out the harmful apps but also shut their door to their developers. In theory, they do not lack the means to detect and get rid of these apps, so what lies behind their inertia.