HACKER Q&A
📣 liberia

Why are there so many shady browsers in the iOS App Store?


A search for ‘web browser’ in the iOS App Store yields the usual: Firefox, Chrome, Brave, etc but if you keep scrolling you get sketchier and sketchier browsers which have questionable privacy. Things like Aloha Browser, Puffin, and things like Private Browser Deluxe among a slew of others. How are they even allowed? They’re mostly a reskin of Safari with additional features like AD blockers and bundled VPN, but they’re also a huge data grab and I don’t trust them one bit.

Why all the shady browsers?

  👤 phillipseamore Accepted Answer ✓
"They’re mostly a reskin of Safari": Every browser on iOS is has to use Safari, it's the only browser engine allowed on iOS and iPadOS.

There's a lot of garbage, and even plain malware, on the app store, despite Apple's claims about security and privacy.

I do wonder why all those different "private browsers" were created in the first place. They must see some gap in Apples marketing claims of privacy, or they see an opportunity in some users distrust of Apple.

👤 freediver
> iOS App Store yields the usual: Firefox, Chrome, Brave, etc

What makes these not a huge data grab?