Coinbase Bitcoin Wallet App Gets Axed From iOS App Store

http://bitcoinblogger.com/apple-still-afraid-bitcoin-coinbase-bitcoin-wallet-app-gets-axed-ios-app-store/

by clamprecht • 13 years ago

113 70 13 years ago

ceejayoz• 13 years ago

Afraid of Bitcoin? No. Afraid of regulators? I'd imagine.

sciguy77• 13 years ago

I'm not sure "afraid," is the right word. Perhaps Apple's legal team is just trying to avoid potential run ins with the law?

seiji• 13 years ago

Saying generic-big-organization-or-government is "afraid" of you is a generic tactic to empower your cult-like base into thinking they matter.

It's the "doctors hate this elementary school teacher who discovered one weird trick!" of pet causes.

johnpowell• 13 years ago

Or when another site disappears and takes the money with them Apple doesn't want to deal with people thinking Apple will get their money back.

pat2man2• 13 years ago

This isn't new at all: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonmatonis/2012/06/13/why-apple-...

It was nice to have the Coinbase app but there was always a risk they were going to pull it. Gliph still works...

eridius• 13 years ago

That entire article is based on a completely wrong premise. From the first paragraph:

With the introduction of Passbook, Apple has launched mobile payments on iOS and competing virtual payment systems, including bitcoin, must be terminated.

Except Passbook isn't mobile payments on iOS. The article was wrong then, and it's still wrong now. There seems to be no relation at all between Passbook and Bitcoin.

colinbartlett• 13 years ago

I sure hope Apple can't force an uninstall of apps I've already downloaded and installed... This makes me distrust the auto app update feature of iOS 7.

shinratdr• 13 years ago

They can, but never have.

samweinberg• 13 years ago

Source?

e28eta• 13 years ago

Honestly, I bet they have. Either:

1. The App Store approval process (and app sand boxing) is so good that no malware made it through that needed the kill switch. Or,

2. Malware has made it out to customers, and the kill switch was used. However, Apple certainly isn't going to publicize that fact, and the malware author probably isn't going to either.

nextstep• 13 years ago

What happens to an app when Apple pulls it from the store? The app remains on the devices that already downloaded it -- does this just prevent anyone from getting updates and any new users from downloading the coinbase app?

maushu• 13 years ago

Apple can do both. Either remain (without updates or new users) or remote uninstall on every device (generally used for malware).

MBCook• 13 years ago

or remote uninstall on every device (generally used for malware)

Has Apple ever done this or said they could?

Technically, it would obviously be possible, but I don't remember Apple doing it.

My understanding is that when an app is pulled, it's usually still available for download if you had already bought it; but they have removed even that ability in a few cases.

auctiontheory• 13 years ago

Right now, I'm connected with the Tether app - listed on the App store for less than a day, two years (and two iOS cycles) ago. So once you've downloaded an app, Apple does not generally disable it, even if they no longer approve.

oscilloscope• 13 years ago

The lack of wallets for iPhone and iPad may be one of Bitcoin's biggest hurdles to mass adoption. Many early adopters use Apple products, but much of Bitcoin's appeal is lost if you can't carry it in your pocket. It's part of what makes Bitcoin cash-like.

Coinbase is already unsatisfying, as far as software wallets go, because you have to register with an email address. Your coins are held in a shared wallet, not on the device. But at least you get the idea of how Bitcoin works on a phone.

On the other hand, Apple didn't explicitly design iOS to be a highly secure environment suitable to store digital money on. A couple months ago, a bug in Android's random number generator was discovered that compromised all key pairs which used it. Android wallets had to issue an update which moved all the bitcoin in each wallet to a new address, generated with the patched RNG. But for a day or two, most Android wallets were vulnerable.

bobbles• 13 years ago

As someone fairly new to bitcoin, what is the actual advantage of carrying the wallet in your pocket?

Wouldn't you rather have your wallet stored say on your home PC, but be able to transfer in and out from your mobile device?

stinkytaco• 13 years ago

You need a wallet to make purchases using your phone (i.e. a wallet with its own address to transfer from or to). It's just like carrying cash. I can't transfer cash from home once I'm at the store, I need it right there. So what I do is usually transfer some bitcoin from my "main wallet" to my "phone wallet" when I think I might need it. If there are no wallet's for the iPhone, however (I use Android so I have no idea if this is actually true), then bitcoin on the go is useless to me.

pat2man2• 13 years ago

For storing $40 or so (like cash in a wallet) iOS's keychain should be plenty secure. For larger amounts the Coinbase method seems pretty good. They don't have to trust the device.

wyager• 13 years ago

There are two wallets available in the app store. Blockchain and Coinjar. I can attest to the security and great UI of Blockchain. I don't know anything about coinjar.

richcollins• 13 years ago

You can't send with Blockchain, can you?

dave1010uk• 13 years ago

Is there anything a native Bitcoin app could do that a web app couldn't do without a proxy to the Bitcoin network? (Which is what I believe Coinbase does anyway)

dingaling• 13 years ago

Many early adopters use Apple products

Bitcoin is now > $400, it's well past early adoption stage. That was back in mid-2011.

( As an example, I did a technical presentation about Bitcoin to ${WORK}, a very traditional financial services company, in July 2011. Even then and in that context it wasn't a startling new concept. )

What's occurring now is the 'gold rush' stage, in which mid-curve-technology-awareness people are willing to use whatever technology is necessary to secure some Bitcoinage. I don't think the lack of iOS wallets is hindering that.

hrrsn• 13 years ago

There's still the Blockchain wallet app.

rookadook• 13 years ago

They are not afraid of bitcoin or anything like that. They just don't like bad apps. sorry.

stefan_kendall• 13 years ago

That's just false. Apple rejects things without reason just 'cause. Quality is the catch all they use to reject apps arbitrarily.

wildchild• 13 years ago

Why people still trust all these cloud wallets? Can't they be hacked/hack oneself some day?

aqme28• 13 years ago

Anything can be hacked, but sometimes it's good to have money on hand to pay bar tabs with. Can't do that with my buried-in-the-ground wallet.

kybernetyk2• 13 years ago

There are alternatives that don't require centralized VC funded startups to act as banks for these cases. One would be: Having a mini wallet on paper (QR code for easy handling) and paying from that in your bar.

nwh2• 13 years ago

Doesn't make sense really. There's two other wallets, blockchain.info's and Coinjar.io's which are still sitting pretty.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/blockchain/id493253309

https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/coinjar-for-iphone/id7252098...

More likely they removed it to fix a bug, than it being forcefully taken down.

coinbase-craig2• 13 years ago

We didn't remove it.

chid2• 13 years ago

Doesn't Apple give you a reason for pulling it?

gigq• 13 years ago

Will you guys be supporting the previous app for people that have already downloaded it? Or at least not making any API changes that will break it?

kovyakov• 13 years ago

Sadlly I formated my ipod without a backup... Lost my app I wish the best dfor you guys, hope it come back

javis• 13 years ago

Seeing as those are still up and haven't been removed, I'm guessing the Coinbase app was removed for quality reasons. I used the thing and wasn't impressed. The experience wasn't great. Hopefully if they fix it up and resubmit the app, Apple will allow it back in.

coinbase-craig2• 13 years ago

That wasn't the reason that Apple provided us with.

e: clarity

cwilson• 13 years ago

I find this statement to be a bit absurd. The app is polished, looks good, easy to use, and has never once crashed on me. I'm honestly not sure what it could do better...

Fix what up exactly?

kybernetyk2• 13 years ago

removed for quality reasons

If apple would start doing this 90% of the apps in the store had to be purged.

dangrossman• 13 years ago

Doesn't Apple require that in-app purchases happen through their system (where they take a cut)? The Coinbase app let you buy Bitcoins with US dollars. Sounds like a TOS violation, not an anti-Bitcoin conspiracy or fear of regulation. Admittedly, I'm not an iOS developer and don't keep up on changes to their developer guidelines, so I don't know if that rule still stands or if it applies here.

smtddr• 13 years ago

That rule absolutely still applies today. It gets a little fuzzy in some situations. I wonder if ETrade has to give apple a cut since Etrade makes money on every buy/sell transaction... or the Amazon shopping app...

P.S., I just signed up with coinbase.com 2 days ago and entered in my bank details. My heart stopped when I saw coinbase on the frontpage of HN; given the kind of news we've been hearing about bitcoin-xchgs these last few days...

andrewpi• 13 years ago

No, Amazon and E*Trade don't have to pay Apple in those situations. The App Store only gets a cut of content delivered to the iPhone.

clamprecht2• 13 years ago

I don't know Apple's rule. But I know that PayPal has an iPhone app they describe as "your new digital wallet". Bitcoin is a digital wallet.[1] Does PayPal give Apple a cut for each payment? Somehow I doubt it.

Source: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paypal/id283646709

adventureloop• 13 years ago

I don't think that is the case. With the banking app from RBS I can perform bank transfers and even pay money to contacts. Apple surely can't be getting a cut of that.

Yhippa• 13 years ago

This is very disappointing. It's their house and you have to play by their rules I guess. This is why I have to keep diversifying where I acquire content from these ecosystems.

Hats off to the guys at Coinbase. I really like their approach to Bitcoin so far.

frank_boyd• 13 years ago

Time to axe the iOS app store. Time for new open platforms.

duncan_bayne• 13 years ago

"Owner of closed, proprietary walled-garden chooses to exclude yet another app based on their own inscrutable decision making process."

How is this news?

miguelrochefort3• 13 years ago

I'm the developer of the of the only Bitcoin wallet client on Windows Phone. It works with both Coinbase and Blockchain.

http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/bitcoin/ca65fc5b...

The app initially got rejected multiple times, for many different reasons (not related to the quality of the app). My feeling is that they were trying to find excuses not to accept this kind of app. During the first few months, I had to disable the payment function (making the app pretty much useless). Ultimately, I rebuilt the whole app, and integrated it directly with Windows Phone's Wallet (think Passbook). I'm still not sure why, but they accepted it right away.

Perhaps they could use the same approach, and integrate Coinbase with Passbook, giving one more reason for people to use Passbook (which I believe Apple would appreciate)? I'm not quite sure, but it worked for me.

clamprecht2• 13 years ago

I love this idea. I just used Passbook for the first time recently. I got to the airport and my Delta passes were on my home screen. It was great.

I'm thinking an integration with CoinMap, where if you walk into a store that accepts Bitcoin, it shows up on your home screen (if this is possible).

miguelrochefort3• 13 years ago

I'm thinking an integration with CoinMap, where if you walk into a store that accepts Bitcoin, it shows up on your home screen (if this is possible).

That would be awesome actually.

skrebbel• 13 years ago

Completely off topic, but you've got a lovely review over there:

Stole all my coins

Obviously bull, but damn, some people just do damage for the heck of it, don't they?

miguelrochefort3• 13 years ago

I know... and there's nothing I can do about it.

I wish I could contact reviewers...

I just hope it's not a bug, but it would be extremely surprising.

Fuxy2• 13 years ago

And this is why Apple has lost its way.

I doubt Steve Jobs would have allowed the situation to be handled so badly.

Then again I may be wrong. The concept of an app store is great for having all the apps in one place but it's prone to abuse when run by a company.

There shouldn't be any reason other quality, viruses or spyware to reject an app.

Refusing an app because its in competition with your product is anti-competitive and should be illegal.

rmc2• 13 years ago

Anything Apples does wrong people are now saying "This wouldn't happen under Jobs". How quickly people forget the iPhone 4's antenna problem and Steve Job's response of "You're holding it wrong."

Fuxy2• 13 years ago

You're comparing a irreversible hardware problem with a policy problem.

Short of recalling all Iphone 4's there was nothing he could do.

Why do you thing they gave out free rubber straps? That was them basically admitting they messed up.

And no I'm not idolizing him I have never owned an Iphone or an apple product in general but he was a great leader.

drob• 13 years ago

Excuse me?

This exact behavior happened all the time when Steve Jobs ran Apple. Remember Google Voice, or the countless other apps that Apple banned from the walled garden for whatever reason?

If anything, this is evidence that Apple hasn't changed.

patrickk• 13 years ago

Not to mention refusing an app, then ripping off the idea:

http://www.dailytech.com/Apple+Accused+of+Ripping+Off+Develo...

frabcus• 13 years ago

He definitely did - for example, Apple banned several cartoonists back in 2010. http://gawker.com/5524983/cartoons-banned-by-apple-a-gallery...

arrrg• 13 years ago

Random, weird rejections with no (or only a vague) explanation are prototypical Steve Jobs Apple. This policy is Steve Jobs Apple incarnate. This is one of the defining characteristics of an Apple under Steve Jobs.

One has to be astonishingly unperceptive to not see this.

bernatfp• 13 years ago

Well, I guess they can focus on integrating Litecoin into their system now...

dan1234• 13 years ago

If the keys are stored at Coinbase and the app is just using APIs to talk back to the site, is there anything the app was doing that couldn't be replicated through a mobile website?

pyalot2• 13 years ago

Curious question. If you deploy a wallet app trough an app-store (such as iOS appstore or google play), people send coins to that wallet and then the app-store pulls the app, which will also delete the app from the users device, the coins are gone no?

I'm assuming that Apple or Google won't take responsibility for the wanton destruction of your property.

So maybe deploying wallet apps on devices where you don't control when your wallet gets nuked isn't such a great idea.

damon_c• 13 years ago

I'm pretty sure Apple removing an app from the store has no effect on installations already on people's devices.

This may have changed with iOS 7's auto updates.

throwwit• 13 years ago

Adding to the speculation: Could apple be protecting it's business model? A bitcoin transaction can be a means of purchasing in an app without the 30% cut.

Coinbase Bitcoin Wallet App Gets Axed From iOS App Store

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