AdAway and other ad blocker removed from Google Play

[DominikMember]

Just want to inform you that AdAway was removed from Google Play. I received an email today stating that it had been removed due to “Violation of section 4.4 of the Developer Distribution Agreement.” [0]

The same happened to other ad blockers like Adblock Plus.

This behavior of Google makes F-Droid even more important than before! Keep up the good work guys!

I will now always recommend F-Droid as the primary source for AdAway.

[0] Complete email:

“This is a notification that your application, AdAway, with package ID org.adaway, has been removed from the Google Play Store.

REASON FOR REMOVAL: Violation of section 4.4 of the Developer Distribution Agreement.

After a regular review we have determined that your app interferes with or accesses another service or product in an unauthorized manner. This violates the provision of your agreement with Google referred to above.

All violations are tracked. Serious or repeated violations of any nature will result in the termination of your developer account, and investigation and possible termination of related Google accounts. If your account is terminated, payments will cease and Google may recover the proceeds of any past sales and/or the cost of any associated fees (such as chargebacks and transaction fees) from you.

If your developer account is still in good standing, you may revise and upload a new instance of the application that is compliant with the developer terms. Before uploading any new applications, please review the Developer Distribution Agreement and Content Policy.

If you feel we have made this determination in error, you can visit this Google Play Help Center article for additional information regarding this removal.

The Google Play Team “

[DominikMember]

FYI: http://techcrunch.com/2013/03/13/google-pulls-ad-blocking-apps-from-play-store-for-violating-developer-distribution-agreement/

[DominikMember]

See also: http://www.androidpolice.com/2013/03/13/breaking-google-has-begun-purging-ad-blocking-apps-from-the-play-store/

Seems to be good advertisement (find the irony…) for F-Droid. This site is getting slow…

[qetuopMember]

Dominik, your software brought me here.  I appreciate AdAway.  Keep up the good work. 🙂

[ClaymoreMember]

If we’re honest: This was a plain self-headshot. Many people would have never known of such apps. And if, they may have said: “Nah, for what.”. Now they’re reading the comments from users and developers and probably will root their phones (or not, with AdBlock).

The main fact is: It was a damn good publicity for all developers of blocking apps. @dominik: Now you can again include the donation-button, directing to Paypal directly, instead to Google :).

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