A suspicious iPhone VPN app has been spotted on the Apple App Store and it's charging an exorbitant price for its services — even though it's riddled with five-star reviews.
Spotted by FlickType founder Kosta Eleftheriou, XGate VPN on iOS charges $12 per week for its "premium services," which means it is asking for $624 per year for its services. To put this into perspective, the best VPN services charge an average of around $5 per month for an annual subscription. Something is fishy, here.
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The app’s screenshots are pretty standard, while the description is riddled with typos - and almost feels like it’s *trying* to be a big unreadable wall of text: pic.twitter.com/ECtkPOq8rVApril 14, 2021
While the price is reason enough to believe this VPN is a scam, Eleftheriou points out the app is filled with other red flags. The iOS app and description is filled with typos, and some menus simply have placeholder text in the title.
The five-star ratings appear to be fake, with hundreds of reviews (most posted on the same day) trying to increase the App's validity. However, there are plenty of one-star ratings stating the app is a scam, with one claiming it also has viruses. This reviewer gave the app five stars to warn other potential users of how bad it is.
VPN services should never charge that much, and you'll find more trustworthy providers such as ExpressVPN and NordVPN offer much more affordable options for annual subscription plans.
After searching Apple's App Store, XGate VPN appears to have been taken down. However, that doesn't mean unsuspecting users could still have the app installed on their smartphones.
Despite Apple's reputation for running a tight ship in terms of privacy and security on its App Store, there have been other scam apps making their way onto the store. For instance, a Bitcoin scam app recently duped a user into giving away over $600,000.
The tech giant may state that more than 500 dedicated experts around the world review over 100,000 iOS apps to make sure they are safe, it's always best to do a background check before downloading an app. Oh, and always check those one-star reviews.
(H/T Phone Arena)
