Number of apps in Windows 10 Phone Store grows rapidly, but most are fake

It's an often heard negative of Windows Phone, the number of popular apps is far behind iOS or Android. More popular apps make a mobile operating system more attractive to users. The Windows 10 Phone Store now sees a lot of new apps, but a large number is fake.

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The issue isn't new, with the release of Windows Phone 8.1 the Windows Phone Store was also infested with a large number of fake apps. Microsoft tried to remove most of them after which the issue appeared to be solved. The software giant also promised to be more strict on which apps would pass its quality checks, but it appears Microsoft isn't really keeping its promise.

Users on the Windows Central Forums found that a search for the popular game Traffic Rider resulted in many fake applications which use variations of the name of the game. The same search on Windows 10, for which the game is also available, only showed the actual game. The fake apps use the name of the game with additionals dots, commas and additions like Plus, Pro and Gaming.

The fake apps are much smaller in size (about 900Kb vs about 90MB for the original) and request more permissions such as using the phone, retrieving the location and access to the user's photos.

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It shouldn't be too hard for Microsoft to remove the apps especially as on the Windows 10 App Store the issue doesn't seem to exist. For users it's also fairly easy to differentiate between the actual game and the fake apps, the real game has a star rating and actual reviews, the fake ones do not.

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