Aart's "Chess for Android" has a twin!

[asimpereira]

https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... roid.chesx

Aart, Does the app look familiar?

[asimpereira]

Apology, this post was more fitting in the "general discussion" category, maybe.

[Adam Hair]

Apology, this post was more fitting in the "general discussion" category, maybe.

No problem.

[Adam Hair]

https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... roid.chesx

Aart, Does the app look familiar?

It is Chess for Android with advertisement added.

[abik]

Aart, Does the app look familiar?

Thanks for the heads up. I suppose plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery, but I can't say I appreciate someone just removing my name and publishing the app as an original product.

[Adam Hair]

Aart, Does the app look familiar?

Thanks for the heads up. I suppose plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery, but I can't say I appreciate someone just removing my name and publishing the app as an original product.

I can not express publicly what I think about "Shorizonter", but it is deplorable to see an example of blatant theft such as this.

[gerold]

Aart, Does the app look familiar?

Thanks for the heads up. I suppose plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery, but I can't say I appreciate someone just removing my name and publishing the app as an original product.

Maybe you could write a review on their site about your own product.

[kinderchocolate]

Aart, Does the app look familiar?

Thanks for the heads up. I suppose plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery, but I can't say I appreciate someone just removing my name and publishing the app as an original product.

But you haven't released the source? He was just mocking the your user interface and experience, so you should feel proud!

[asimpereira]

No, looks like he has done more than mock the UI (or shall I say "less", since he has simply reverse engineered the apk and NOT done any work of his own!)

Aarts package = com.google.android.chess
His package = cox.google.indroid.chesx
(he has carefully kept the same bytes, just changed few letters)

Aarts preferences file = Chess.xml
His preferences file = Chess.xml
(both xmls have the EXACT keys as well!)

So its a blatant copy!

[Houdini]

From what I've discovered during the development of Houdini for Android, it is just a matter of minutes to take any Android App, disassemble it automatically and recompile a slightly modified version.

There is a public, freely available tool that produces "smali" source code which can then simply be modified and recompiled. The tool also automatically removes the most common software protection schemes that are proposed by the Android SDK.

The bottom-line is that there is just zero protection for an Android App, which is a rather disappointing situation.

Robert