This app is set to stop people from installing apks or using stores and apps not accepted by google ("verification" requires payment of course). The play store listing does not have images, a proper description, and the app cannot be opened.

Screenshots from the play app because google did something custom for this playstore listing which crashes Aurora. It's fixed in the latest fdroid release, but I noticed that too late, so most screenshots are from googles shitty app.

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[–] 72 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Or, hear me out, it could be one of the most shady companies in world (google), that has both control over infra and motive to do it.

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  • [–] 46 points 1 day ago (2 children)

    Why would they need bots to inflate the star rating? They own the whole system, they could just overwrite it with whatever the hell they wanted if they wanted to commit some fraud.

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  • [–] 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 child)

    Google doesn't do things directly. They contract other companies to do the dirty bot work like how they pay scrapers for information and pretend they aren't contributing to it. It would not surprise me if they pay other companies to "promote" and maintain plausible deniability as to what exactly that means.

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