Sanctioned Russian Bank VTB Sneaked an App Into the App Store ⇥ 9to5mac.com

Zac Hall, 9to5Mac:

But on Friday morning, a random productivity app called Cириус broke into the top three.

[…]

The reality seems to be that the app is a Russian banking app disguised as a Pomodoro timer. Activity on Telegram this week points to the app actually being a client for Russian financial institution VTB Bank.

The link on “VTB Bank” goes to Wikipedia instead of VTB’s website, where the first tab on the home page slider is currently advertising this app. It is barely disguised. In Russian media, the developer says there are other apps lined up to take the place of this one after it is inevitably removed. Apple and Google have repeatedly failed to catch apps violating U.S. sanctions.

Hall:

The app will almost certainly be pulled soon, but it’s always surprising that existing systems in place sometimes miss detecting apps disguised like this.

I suppose the App Store review process could always be worse, but it is no longer surprising that its team, too focused elsewhere, does not catch egregious rule-breakers.