Hello, as per this article (https://igamingbusiness.com/tech-innovation/apple-will-only-allow-native-ios-gambling-apps-in-app-store/) it appears that gambling is only allowed in applications which are developed natively for iOS and not just wrapping HTML5 content.
I would like to understand to what extent this applies to - The company i'm working follows said policy to the full extent, however, i'm just questioning whether this is absolutely required and intended by Apple themselves as well as in my opinion it does not fulfill it's purpose, since it hinders the ability for gambling companies to do rapid configuration or changes to features aimed for player protection.
To paint you a picture here's how, conceptually, a gambling site works:
- A main webpage which players use to log in. This is usually the place where user picks the games, manages bonuses, sets limits, controls the user actions, manages account, payment etc.
- Launcher - this part is responsible for finding the correct game and then launching it, based on the given configuration. More so, this component may act as a "wrapper" and load games inside the frame. This allows the launcher component to fulfill regulatory requirements associated with the jurisdiction.
- Games - actual content, where users play games in.
All of these components may come from different companies - website is built by the main casino who's the license holder, launcher is managed by different company who aggregates games, and technically each individual game may come from a different company. However, only a single company can manage the application and build it. Hence, in case of any changes in the codebase of any of those applications, this needs to be distributed to the owner of application. Since any change to files triggers an update (and requires review) company is very careful when making such changes. Thus, testing on iOS devices and rolling out changes goes against any reasonable paradigm which nowadays distributed systems and enterprise architecture has (such as continuous integration and deployments) as it is nearly impossible to test end to end scenarios easily.
This is a highly regulated field as Apple guidelines themselves mention. However, if the company who's distributing the app has provided all of the necessary requirements to operate in the jurisdiction (i.e the certification the casino is operating with, games certifications and so forth), why is this extra gatekeeping layer required? More so, is there anything to do about it? Are there any workarounds, i.e pull the data via Apple or any other validated CDNs? Is it possible that this requirement only applies to the games (however the linked article would indicate otherwise) and components which deal with regulations and configurations could be excluded?