An App Store bug has caused the removal of more than 22 million ratings for iOS apps, with both small and big developers affected, including Microsoft and Google.
The bug wreaked havoc between October 23 and October 24, and it affected more than 300 app from over 200 developers.
The discovery was made by AppFigures and first reported by TechCrunch, with an analysis of the damage revealing that in some cases, apps lost no less than 95 percent of their ratings in specific countries.
For example, a total of 95 percent of the ratings that were published in the United States for Hulu got purged due to the bug, while Dropbox experienced a drop of approximately 85 percent in the number of reviews after the glitch kicked in.
Positive and negative reviews removed
As far as the number of reviews that got removed is concerned, Starbucks appears to be hit the hardest, as it lost 1.6 million ratings published in the App Store. Chase Mobile, Walgreens, Venmo, and Hulu, all lost over 1 million ratings due to the bug.
The removal didn’t happen only in the United States, as similar rating removals happened in other countries. However, not all regions were affected, AppFigures explains.
“Although the US, which saw 10 million ratings go poof, was hit the hardest, this sweep was a global one hitting all 155 countries Apple supports. China, the UK, South Korea, Russia, and Australia followed the US, with 2.7 million ratings deleted in this sweep. But, it’s important to note that most individual apps only got hit in a few countries and not all. This could indicate this isn’t a simple “error” but rather something more intentional,” the analysis reveals.
Both positive and negative ratings were removed, and Apple is reportedly working on restoring all of them, albeit specifics on when everything should be back to normal aren’t available just yet.
https://news.softpedia.com/news/apple-app-store-bug-removes-over-20-million-ratings-for-hundreds-of-iphone-apps-528062.shtml
