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Comment by dahart | Hacker News Reader

A lot can be said about Apple and walled gardens for sure, but is it fair to mostly blame Apple for the region locked insurance app, rather than the app developer? That was the developer’s choice to do, not Apple’s. Hopefully Anees’ insurance also has an website and contact numbers for emergencies. Android supports region locking and has some region locked apps too, it appears, according to Google. Is the Android version of the app in question not region locked on Android? We don’t know since he used an emulator. Maybe region locking is easy to get around if you’re technical, but in an emergency for most non-technical people, the outcome will be the same on Android as it is on Apple, no?

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I agree that this is might not be the most-likely-to-kill-you aspect of using walled gardens, but since it's what the article is about... No, the vendor of your hardware should not be participating in schemes like region locking. You paid them for the device, they're supposed to be working for you, not against you.

The fact that google does it also doesn't make it ok.

For apps, you pay the developer and Apple takes a cut, right? The developers are the ones demanding region locking functionality, and either way they are also paying Apple. Apple’s not working against you so much as serving multiple customers, and developers get more say in how apps work. I agree that Google also doing it doesn’t justify the practice, my main point was that moving to Android doesn’t actually fix the problem like the article implied.

> The developers are the ones demanding region locking functionality

For paid apps, maybe. For the free app that is the companion to a meat-space service you are already paying for (insurance, banking, etc), region locking is a liability all-round.

I've spent countless hours working around this while travelling, and in some cases just haven't been able to use services I've paid for.

Oh I don’t doubt it’s a hassle. But you are paying the bank/insurance company, outside of Apple’s payment system, and they’re the ones refusing you international service, right? Have you tried calling them up to get support while traveling and ask why they’re blocking other countries, or ask if they offer other ways to authenticate and get in?

It might be nice for you if Apple refused to let devs build region locked apps, but that might cause other bigger problems for other people, right? For banking, hacking attempts from other countries in general is a big and serious issue. My banking app offers a region locking option for my own security, and I’m sure many banks can safely assume that login attempts from other countries are illegitimate.

> Have you tried calling them up to get support while traveling and ask why they’re blocking other countries, or ask if they offer other ways to authenticate and get in?

The trouble with that is you might need to buy a region-compatible sim card to call the bank, and you might need to call the bank in order to buy the sim card. (I was lucky I could find wifi and had a VPN set up so I could make myself appear in the US).

> My banking app offers a region locking option for my own security

This is a different thing, though - a region lock on logins might be useful.

What these companies are doing is only region locking installation. If you already have the app installed, you can use it from overseas just fine

(and you can generally setup an arbitrary-region Google/Apple account over a VPN, so the scammers just work around it that way).

> developers get more say in how apps work.

They do, but they shouldn't. This is one of the worst things about modern technology. My device, my rules, end of story. I should be able to change the inputs to the application such that it thinks it's in whatever region I decide, because I physically control and operate the device.

> For apps, you pay the developer and Apple takes a cut, right?

Yes, and it's very wrong that the device seller gets to take part on that deal too.

> Apple’s not working against you so much as serving multiple customers

Apple is explicitly working against you here. Yes, it was hired by somebody else to do it, but no, this doesn't make it ok.

And you were certainly right about that. I just couldn't resist the opportunity for a little rabble rousing. We shouldn't let them treat us like this (neither app nor platform).

> Android supports region locking and has some region locked apps too, it appears, according to Google.

No, Android does not support region locking. Neither does iOS. (Technically, you can make your app look at the SIM country and exit if it's not what you want, but nobody does this.) App stores on those platforms support region locking. The problem the author is highlighting is that you can't just get the ipk and install it directly to get around the app store's restrictions like you can on most Android phones.

> Maybe region locking is easy to get around if you’re technical, but in an emergency for most non-technical people, the outcome will be the same on Android as it is on Apple, no?

Unless something has change in the past few years since I needed to do this, you can get around it on iPhone by creating a new Apple ID for the new region and logging your phone into that account.

[added] probably not the first thing one thinks about if they are in a heighten anxiety/panic state though

Nowadays you might need a payment method with billing address in that region.

It depends on how you get into the signup flow - if you just try to sign up for the App Store it requires a payment method, but if you try to install a free app, it will have the option for not entering a payment method.

Shitty, anti-consumer dark pattern from Apple.

Apple Music was the app that prevented them from changing regions, is there a Google app that would prevent the same?

It was the Apple Music Subscription tied to their account that was locking the region of the account, not the app.

> Is the Android version of the app in question not region locked on Android?

It probably is, I didn't check. I was able to grab the APK and install it directly

On Android, you can sideload an APK that you got from somewhere other than Playstore.

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