I'm using BT v1.4. Apple rejected my app because of: 17.1 We found your app does not obtain user consent before collecting their personal data, as required by the App Store Review Guidelines. Specifically, the scores for your app's quiz are automatically uploaded. To collect personal user data with your app, you must make it clear to the user that their personal user data will be uploaded to your server and you must obtain the user's consent before the data is uploaded. ==== Has anyone seen this one before? Thoughts, suggestions? Thanks, Jeff

For the record - the quiz is a silly dog quiz (e.g. What's my dog's favorite food?). It does not ask any personal questions whatsoever.

Crazy, something sounds funny. 1000's of apps out there with quizzes. Is that all they said? Did you change anything in the app or code?

Whoa... this is disturbing.

@MacApple - Yes, that is all they said. I didn't make any changes to the quiz (the only changes I made to the app were to add dog-type icons - e.g. paw, bone, to the table cells based on the cell text). I just ran the app and it *does* prompt the user to see high scores. I disputed the decision with the resolution center and will post back when I hear something. If anything at all, I would only have expected to be rejected based on getting the location at app startup - but even then, the user is prompted for allowing this (although they aren't told why). Thank you.

I would really like to hear back from this soon! Many users get rejected due to the app not having much of a different experience then from safari - the quiz option in buzz touch is the only way users can avoid that and get approved - if apple starts doing this then buzz touch apps will have a much harder time getting approved for users who prefer to adapt custom url's (shell apps). I wish you the best of luck with your dispute! Perhaps David should look into this as well and editing the quiz framework to stop apple from using 17.1. David.

David. Hate to say this but you are way off the mark with that last comment. If your app just acts like browser that is your limitation not Buzztouch. 1000's with quizzes 1000's without. If url's are all you need maybe you should look at web apps instead.

MacApple - I think you misinterpreted what I meant. What I meant to say was that MANY applications made with buzz are dependent as web apps, meaning, I would bet over half of the apps made with buzz are using external properties - as such apple would usually reject them under the safari can do it policy. I have seen many threads with users getting this problem with apple, adding a quiz, and then getting approved. David.

Steamy - cool. Quiz - collecting user data: For sure this is the first time we've heard of this as a rejection reason. But, we are 100% convinced that we are wasting our time chasing mysterious rejection reasons and engineering things around Apple's one-by-one decision making process. Fact is, Apple's policies, opinions, inconsistencies, and seemingly arbitrary reasons to reject people are never going to end (as best as we can tell). If a rogue app-inspector decides that your app isn't good enough, or has broken a rule, or has web-centric content, you're screwed. Sucks, but true. I can 100% guarantee that EVERY SINGLE app in the App Store has 'broken' a published guideline or policy. This is not because the app is bogus, it's because the policies and guidelines can be interpreted in tons of different ways including calling it a no-go in the App Store. I'm a huge Apple fan, amazing products. I have a tremendous amount of respect for their success. However, it's not surprising at all when an app is rejected for some crazy reason. It happens every single day to developers all over the world. I fear (for Apple) that It's 1980 all over again and 'here comes windows' unless they figure out that selling computers (including iOS powered computers) that cannot install anyting without Steve's approval will be their downfall. We are not focussed on creating software to help sneak-through Apple's random thoughts of the day. We are here to help folks make apps. If Apple doesn't like the apps people make, so be it. Our business is not focussed on the App Store today, and won't be in the future. Web-Only-Apps, or, 'shell apps' to quote @David: Here's the thing, anyone can create 'pointers' to web-content. If it's easy, folks will do it. The fact that an application uses web-content does not make it useless or rejectable. But, it generally DOES mean that Safari would be good enough. However, we can't forget the hospital with thousands of PDF docs they don't want Safari opening or the School distributing content in a non-public way. Safari (or HTML5) is not the best choice. I can list hundreds of justifiable reasons that a content heavy app should NOT be rendered in Safari, so can lots and lots of developers. The idea that 'the quiz option in buzz touch is the only way users can avoid that and get approved' is not accurate. It's a work-around for the true rejection reason used by folks that don't understand app design or the market. Sure, adding a quiz may help them get approved but if that's what it took to get them approved, it's very very likely that their app is an advertising engine, spam hole, useless app anyway. Neat, maybe, useful to a broad audience, doubtful. I love these debates and it's great to see the discussion. We fight, argue, and post because we all care about this stuff. On our end, we don't have much say over what folks create and can only try to help expose the new folks to the world of app making. For the seaoned folks, we can only try to make their existing skills more efficient and profitable. As for Apple, we hope they appreciate the tens of thousands of $99 / yr. developers we send them but understand if they don't. We'll continue doing what we do, they what they do, you want you do. In the meantime, get your Windows and Android raincoats on, it's about to downnpour.

Good post. Your right, it seems useless to change buzz around apple approval policies that are so inconsistent (self experienced how inconsistent it is). I honestly think that apple employees only actually use one of those policies to reject a app based on their own opinion of quality. IE, it could be a complete shell app, or it could completely violate several policies, but if it looks, works, and is good - they will approve it regardless (you know, as long as it's not full blown porn or something). If it's a crappy app - they have a nice list of policies in hand to give to people to justify rejection - through probably not really what they care about. Apple only wants the best of the best quality. Sometimes they reject you just to get you to improve the app before approval (I think David said this once, they sometimes want you to work harder on it before they let it go live - even if it does pass through all policies, they have some they can throw at you that are designed to be vague). ///////////////// The idea that 'the quiz option in buzz touch is the only way users can avoid that and get approved' is not accurate. It's a work-around for the true rejection reason used by folks that don't understand app design or the market. Sure, adding a quiz may help them get approved but if that's what it took to get them approved, it's very very likely that their app is an advertising engine, spam hole, useless app anyway. Neat, maybe, useful to a broad audience, doubtful. ///////////////// I can't agree more to this. the true rejection reason - this makes perfect sense to me now.

Good stuff guys. Lively debate is good for the soul. @ David A. Shelechi Don't think I misinterpreted what you said just thought it sounded like the poor joiner blaming his hammer. I've had apps rejected, I've cursed and shouted but I also know that without some of the folks on here I'd be lost and not just because BT has a quiz option. I should just shut up and mind my own business sometimes but..... As for Apple and to echo David, love them and their products, remember my first iMac and iPod and still get blown away by some of the things they do. We should be, to a certain extent, happy that Apple lets our apps in at all. To be part of that huge global App Store that Apple sink billions into is not some right we have, we have to work, we have to innovate, we have to take rejection for weird and wonderful reasons. Pay off is worth it. That said, there will be blood as the movie says, individuals reviewers 3 days into job, guy having a bad day and so on. There are a ton of reasons an individual might refuse your app and Apple has the terms to cover any rejection. By the same token I'm a bit of a Google fan, just not an Android fan at the moment, think it is a far inferior to iOS in many senses and the walled garden of Apple stops some of the crap you see in Marketplace. Google 'rogue apps in Marketplace' to see how many now have virus, sniffing code etc. That said, I need to be in Marketplace every bit as much as I need to be in App Store. Amazon however, no wait, i'll keep that rant for the meeting at the docks tonight. Believe strongly in open source and transparency, something Apple will never adopt, does that make one better or inferior than the other? The jury is, after 25 yrs, still out. I can get a table at Dennys at any time, the exclusive restaurant however might require me shaving, booking in advance and minding my P's and Q's, you follow? This stuff is in its infancy, we are lucky to be in the race at the moment. Off to work. Ps I am by no means or stretch of the imagination a seasoned developer but am working on a nice new home page feature with a jquery slider (trying to mimic the BBC app) Apple could knock it back for being web content only but my thinking is they wont as it'll show the app has had some dev work and not just url's plugged in. We'll see, onwards and upwards.

Has anyone published an app to the app store (had it approved) and then changed it around after the fact? (seeing as it would just reflect whatever new content you chose anyways)

Yes @nschaccher I change my quiz questions all the time :0 No problems

Update to original post... I disputed Apple's decision to reject my app on the grounds that the scoreboard only collects scores and no personal data - i.e. it just uploaded numbers. Six days later, they called and nicely told me over the phone that the board said that it didn't matter whether the device was uploading anonymous strings of numbers (i.e. scores), I still had to get the user's permission. I asked if I could change it and resubmit, and they said, sure. (I'm not sure how uploading an anonymous string of numbers differs from a web request, but whatever). So I modified the app to add an alert prior to selecting Show High Scores - the alert says, This action will upload your scores along with Cancel and Proceed buttons - if the user Cancels, they go back to the Quit/Try Again/Show High Scores display. If they Proceed, their data is uploaded and the high scores are displayed. Meanwhile, I saw that there is more than just score info that is uploaded, even though Apple didn't mention this. After another 6 days, Apple again rejected it. Here is their response (this time they mentioned it): ===== We found your app does not obtain user consent before collecting their personal data, as required by the App Store Review Guidelines. To collect personal user data with your app, you must make it clear to the user that their personal user data will be uploaded to your server and you must obtain the user's consent before the data is uploaded. Specifically, your app sends UDID, device location, and user score information as part of the View High Scores functionality without user consent. An example packet sent from the app is provided below: command=showQuizScoreboard&deviceId=e400df3f0d527846c699d08921b4075623eff2a0&deviceModel=iPhone&deviceLatitude=37.328861&deviceLongitude=-122.009717&appGuid=(null)&screenGuid=DC77024000000b6F5BB8B67FCBCF75C&totalPoints=450&totalSeconds=19.7&numberQuestions=4&numberRight=3& ====== I am now modifying the code to omit the deviceId, deviceModel, deviceLatitude, and deviceLongitude if the command is showQuizScoreboard since the scoreboard doesn't require this data to work correctly. Hopefully this will be approved, but this same data is also sent in other places - like when the application starts up, retrieves menu info, etc... For some reason, Apple seems to have fixated on my silly quiz, though. I'll keep you posted. Hopefully, this is just my app and won't be a new Apple trend...

Good update and good luck. If you're using v1.5 you can turn off lots of this stuff easily. Becuase you're in v1.4 you'll need to do it manually. It's not in as many places as you may think..shouldn't take too long.

I was rejected for the exact same reason. Does anyone know how to disable whatever it is apple doesn't like using 1.4? I can't figure it out... 3rd time submiting..

@piggilypoo: Third time submitting - bummer. If this means your submitting over and over again without actually addressing Apple's concerns it's very unlikely that they will accpet your app. And, to make matters worse, if you get rejected more than once or twice it becomes much more difficult to make them 'happy.' It's tough to give any advice without knowing more about their complaing. If their complaining about not asking the user for permission before submitting their scores to a backend (on a quiz) you'll need to figure out a way to inform them of your intentions.

Is there a way to just remove the part where the app submits their scores? So it just tells them their score without submitting anything... that way hopefully I won't get rejected again!

Great idea! To do this... find TakeQuizViewController.m in the Screen_Quiz folder. Scroll down to line 512 to the endQuiz method. This method runs when the quiz is over. Have a look at the code. I realize it's cryptic but take your time, it makes sense. It's doing a few things, the important thing here is the message it's building to show the user. The message shows an alert with a few choices. One of which is Show Scoreboard. If the user choose this the Scoreboard is displayed and the results are passed to the server. Remove this option by taking away the button title Show High Scores. You'll see where the 'other button titles' are added. Removing the option will remove the button. This will prevent the scoreboard option from showing.