Chromium Blog: Keeping spam off the Chrome Web Store

Chromium Blog

News and developments from the open source browser project

Keeping spam off the Chrome Web Store

Wednesday, April 29, 2020

Since the introduction of the Chrome Web Store in 2011, it has become the largest catalog of browser extensions with over 200,000 available to all of our users. This has helped millions of users to customize their browsing experience on Chrome in ways we could have never imagined, from niche utilities to companies building businesses around the platform’s capabilities.

In response, our abuse systems and review teams have been hard at work ensuring that the Chrome Web Store is free from abuse, as many of our developers have noticed an increase in review times lately. However, the increase in adoption of the extension platform has also attracted spammers and fraudsters introducing low-quality and misleading extensions in an attempt to deceive and trick our users into installing them to make a quick profit. We want to ensure that the path of a user discovering an extension from the Chrome Web Store is clear and informative and not muddled with copycats, misleading functionalities or fake reviews and ratings. Therefore, in order to keep the quality of our inventory high and help users find what they want, we’re introducing some updates to our spam policy:

Developers or their affiliates should not publish multiple extensions that provide duplicate experiences or functionality on the Chrome Web Store.

Extensions should not have misleading, improperly formatted, non-descriptive, irrelevant, excessive, or inappropriate metadata, including but not limited to the extension’s description, developer name, title, icon, screenshots, and promotional images. Developers must provide a clear and well-written description. Unattributed or anonymous user testimonials in the app's description are also not allowed.

Developers must not attempt to manipulate the placement of any extensions in the Chrome Web Store. This includes, but is not limited to, inflating product ratings, reviews, or install counts by illegitimate means, such as fraudulent or incentivized downloads, reviews and ratings.

Extensions with a single purpose of installing or launching another app, theme, webpage, or extension are not allowed.

Extensions that abuse, or are associated with the abuse of, notifications by sending spam, ads, promotions, phishing attempts, or unwanted messages that harm the user’s browsing experience are not allowed. Extensions that send messages on behalf of the user without giving the user the ability to confirm the content and intended recipients are also not allowed.

The new policy can be found in our updated Developer Program Policies.

Developers must comply with this policy by August 27th 2020. After that date, extensions that violate the updated policy may be taken down and disabled. You can learn more about these changes and how they may apply to you in our Spam policy FAQ.

Posted by Rebecca Soares and Benjamin Ackerman, Chrome Policy and Anti-Abuse Team

Google

Labels

$200K 1
10th birthday 4
abusive ads 1
abusive notifications 2
accessibility 3
ad blockers 1
ad blocking 2
advanced capabilities 1
android 2
anti abuse 1
anti-deception 1
background periodic sync 1
badging 1
benchmarks 1
beta 83
better ads standards 1
billing 1
birthday 4
blink 2
browser 2
browser interoperability 1
bundles 1
capabilities 6
capable web 1
cds 1
cds18 2
cds2018 1
chrome 35
chrome 81 1
chrome 83 2
chrome 84 2
chrome ads 1
chrome apps 5
Chrome dev 1
chrome dev summit 1
chrome dev summit 2018 1
chrome dev summit 2019 1
chrome developer 1
Chrome Developer Center 1
chrome developer summit 1
chrome devtools 1
Chrome extension 1
chrome extensions 3
Chrome Frame 1
Chrome lite 1
Chrome on Android 2
chrome on ios 1
Chrome on Mac 1
Chrome OS 1
chrome privacy 4
chrome releases 1
chrome security 10
chrome web store 32
chromedevtools 1
chromeframe 3
chromeos 4
chromeos.dev 1
chromium 9
cloud print 1
coalition 1
coalition for better ads 1
contact picker 1
content indexing 1
cookies 1
core web vitals 2
csrf 1
css 1
cumulative layout shift 1
custom tabs 1
dart 8
dashboard 1
Data Saver 3
Data saver desktop extension 1
day 2 1
deceptive installation 1
declarative net request api 1
design 2
developer dashboard 1
Developer Program Policy 2
developer website 1
devtools 13
digital event 1
discoverability 1
DNS-over-HTTPS 4
DoH 4
emoji 1
emscriptem 1
enterprise 1
extensions 27
Fast badging 1
faster web 1
features 1
feedback 2
field data 1
first input delay 1
Follow 1
fonts 1
form controls 1
frameworks 1
fugu 2
fund 1
funding 1
gdd 1
google earth 1
google event 1
google io 2019 1
google web developer 1
googlechrome 12
harmful ads 1
html5 11
HTTP/3 1
HTTPS 4
iframes 1
images 1
incognito 1
insecure forms 1
intent to explain 1
ios 1
ios Chrome 1
issue tracker 3
jank 1
javascript 5
lab data 1
labelling 1
largest contentful paint 1
launch 1
lazy-loading 1
lighthouse 2
linux 2
Lite Mode 2
Lite pages 1
loading interventions 1
loading optimizations 1
lock icon 1
long-tail 1
mac 1
manifest v3 2
metrics 2
microsoft edge 1
mixed forms 1
mobile 2
na 1
native client 8
native file system 1
New Features 5
notifications 1
octane 1
open web 4
origin trials 2
pagespeed insights 1
pagespeedinsights 1
passwords 1
payment handler 1
payment request 1
payments 2
performance 20
performance tools 1
permission UI 1
permissions 1
play store 1
portals 3
prefetching 1
privacy 2
privacy sandbox 4
private prefetch proxy 1
profile guided optimization 1
progressive web apps 2
Project Strobe 1
protection 1
pwa 1
QUIC 1
quieter permissions 1
releases 3
removals 1
rlz 1
root program 1
safe browsing 2
Secure DNS 2
security 36
site isolation 1
slow loading 1
sms receiver 1
spam policy 1
spdy 2
spectre 1
speed 4
ssl 2
store listing 1
strobe 2
subscription pages 1
suspicious site reporter extension 1
TCP 1
the fast and the curious 23
TLS 1
tools 1
tracing 1
transparency 1
trusted web activities 1
twa 2
user agent string 1
user data policy 1
v8 6
video 2
wasm 1
web 1
web apps 1
web assembly 2
web developers 1
web intents 1
web packaging 1
web payments 1
web platform 1
web request api 1
web vitals 1
web.dev 1
web.dev live 1
webapi 1
webassembly 1
webaudio 3
webgl 7
webkit 5
WebM 1
webmaster 1
webp 5
webrtc 6
websockets 5
webtiming 1
writable-files 1
yerba beuna center for the arts 1

Feed

Give us feedback in our Product Forums.

Google
Privacy
Terms

Chromium Blog

Keeping spam off the Chrome Web Store

Labels

Archive

Feed