- Edited
Right. Not trying to point fingers here, trust me, if anything this is my own fault for not having checked every line of source code prior to compilation, and Google isn't the most friendliest of folks to work with either. I'm just trying to figure out what went wrong.
So, i've created my first Android game, uploaded it to Google Play as an internal test & alpha release only for app testing and testing possible implementations of IAP, which was later scrapped since Google now requires you to publish the address of your sanctuary ( a.k.a. home address if you're an indie developer like me ) for every Rick, Nick and D-head to see at the store due to EU's consumer protection laws, and so, i decided my app would be solely ad-supported.
So, when i thought the app was finally ready, i created a brand new App, renaming the previous one '<app name> Internal testing only' since it was now tagged as an IAP-enabled app due to the internal testing i did, and released the new clean one as a production release.
A week later i get two dreadful e-mails from Google stating both my apps were rejected off the store due to my apps requesting sensitive permissions such as accessing contacts and camera & for me not having uploaded a Privacy Policy file. I was totally confused, i couldn't figure out exactly could've be up with my app to trigger such things. So i've emailed the Google support team about the issue, and i was told, 4 days later, today, that my app requested the following permissions:
android.permission.READ_PHONE_STATE android.permission.RECORD_AUDIO android.permission.GET_ACCOUNTS android.permission.READ_CONTACTS android.permission.CAMERA
Even more confused i was now, since i had never set Godot's export permissions to request most, if not all, of those things, if anything, the android.permission.READ_PHONE_STATE would be acceptable for the access network state permission.
Further notes:
-> app only had the Internet and Access Network state permissions enabled; -> export templates were compiled with kloder-games's admob plugin.
I do sincerely apologise if i'm getting my assumptions totally wrong here, i'm no expert in neither java nor gradle.
Looking at kloder-game's files, found here, i've noticed that atleast for iOS, the plugin requests, most oddly notably:
'-framework','CoreTelephony' '-framework','MessageUI' '-framework','CoreBluetooth' '-framework','CoreText' '-framework','ImageIO' '-framework','CoreVideo'
Which i assume are similar for Android. I'm not sure how an ad plugin even as the need to import such frameworks.
And with this alone, i already have two strikes on my account, the third will be a life suspension.
Just a word of advice for other indie developers, you shouldn't continue using Google's draconian app store if you already have two strikes, i will probably use other app stores, and always check every non-official line of code you incorporate into your applications.
In all honesty, i'm having a feeling it might have been Godot mis-configuring the export template.