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A few days ago when I uploaded a new version of my app to the App Store using Xcode, I received the following e-mail from iTunes Connect:

Subject: iTunes Connect: Your app AppName has one or more issues

Dear developer,

We have discovered one or more issues with your recent delivery for "AppName".

The following are for your information only and do not require any action:

We have detected that this build requires the use of standard location services when running in the background. Apps requiring location services will now display the following text disclaimer on the App Store. 'This app may use your location even when it isn’t open, which can decrease device battery life'.

Regards,

The App Store team

And the build that I uploaded cannot be selected for review submission on the iTunes Connect website.

How should I deal with this problem? Thanks.

Community
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Standix
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  • I've also just started seeing this issue, and no builds that generate this email warning can be submitted for review. This appears to be new after this year's winter freeze – bplattenburg Jan 05 '17 at 20:23

7 Answers7

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  • Apple guidelines * If your app requires location usage even in the background mode, In bottom of the app description and iTunesConnect application page you have to put this text

"This app may use your location even when it isn’t open, which can decrease device battery life"

It is important to put this disclaimer so that if user downloads your application he should be aware that location services will be active for the app even when the application is not in the use.

You don't have to put another build, just update the description with this disclaimer and submit for review again. It will get re-reviewed and, if all terms and conditions are valid, it will be approved.

Since Apple services for new application upload is not active from 23rd Dec to 27th Dec due to yearly Christmas holiday, so you should try to submit for review after it.

Let me know if you have any issues.

shim
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Manish Pathak
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    I have the text you mentioned in my app description, and yet every build I upload to iTunes Connect triggers the warning email from Apple to my entire internal team. We have not submitted to the App Store yet, but we do multiple builds to iTunes Connect daily. I get that its just a warning, but I would like the email spam to stop at some point, is there any way to make that happen? – haplo1384 Jan 02 '17 at 14:07
  • We have the same problem. I sent a message to iTunes Connect: https://itunesconnect.apple.com/WebObjects/iTunesConnect.woa/wa/jumpTo?page=contactUs Waiting on a response – shim Jan 02 '17 at 15:51
  • @haplo1384 you do the same thing write to apple or even you can contact the technical support team, because the email which you have received from apple highlights the only issue is with the app description. Can u share the screenshot where you have put the exact description in app description section. – Manish Pathak Jan 03 '17 at 05:43
  • I have done the same and sent a message to iTunes Connect, I will post back if they reply. As for my app description, the last sentence is word for word copy and pasted out of Apple's warning email. – haplo1384 Jan 03 '17 at 13:24
  • And it still didn't silence the emails? – shim Jan 04 '17 at 16:42
  • We just started getting these messages with new build uploads. We didn't change anything with regards to our app, except we added custom text for the NSLocationUsageDescription and NSLocationAlwaysDescription keys. The keys were there in previous builds with empty strings (Apple uses their default language). We now are using custom strings. Did that change the behavior or unrelated? – Fraggle Jan 05 '17 at 16:25
  • Our warning emails from iTunes Connect finally stopped yesterday. We haven't updated the app description recently, so either Apple changed something, or putting that phrase in our app description took a long time to finally trigger on Apple's side. – haplo1384 Jan 06 '17 at 15:37
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I run into this issue long time ago, this is because, if your app is still use location service in the background, it maybe consume the battery.

1) If you want to always use the location service, you should set this, can let you pass the itunes verify:

you should in your Info.plist add NSLocationAlwaysUsageDescription permission, and set the value, why you want to always use the location service.

enter image description here

2) If you just need when user using app this duration to use location service. You should NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription instead of NSLocationAlwaysUsageDescription permission, and you should also set the description why you want to use the permission.

aircraft
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    This issue is not related to the plist descriptions. The app will crash if that description is not set and the app tries to access location services. This question is about the iTunes Connect email being received when a build is uploaded. – shim Jan 02 '17 at 02:51
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While going through the same issue, I found that

Capabilities -> Background Modes -> Location updates

were enabled for my app.

Location access in background

Please deselect this, if your app does not require location updates in background.

Piyush Sharma
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This is not a big problem actually. Apple reviewer already said you "do not require any action" he / she only suggest you it is more appropriate show a warning text (it is appear when you request to use location service within UIAlertView) like this message 'This app may use your location even when it isn’t open, which can decrease device battery life'.

You can add descriptive string in .plist file.

serhat sezer
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  • This issue is not related to the plist descriptions. The app will crash if that description is not set and the app tries to access location services. This question is about the iTunes Connect email being received when a build is uploaded. – shim Jan 02 '17 at 02:53
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Probably you forgot to add NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription or NSLocationAlwaysUsageDescription in plist or you didn't add background mode in capabilities of the project.

Axel
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    This issue is not related to the plist descriptions. The app will crash if that description is not set and the app tries to access location services. This question is about the iTunes Connect email being received when a build is uploaded. – shim Jan 02 '17 at 02:52
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The problem is with your string message you are displaying. i was also once stucked in this kind of issue i was using app name like "Burn you phone". So by changing the message string on location authorization will do the trick.

Abu Ul Hassan
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I had the same problem and contacted iTunes Connect about it. Below are excerpts from their responses so far:

I do understand your concerns about continuing to receive notices with every update or build. I can confirm this is working as expected.

...

There are some emails that are system-generated by iTunes Connect and there is not a way to disable them at this time. If you provide us feedback we will be more than glad to provide it to the appropriate team for future improvements.

...

You can definitely try adding the app description and see if this will resolve the email notifications.

However, we can not assure you that this will cancel the email notifications.

Just wanted to demonstrate their stellar customer support and exemplary knowledge of their own product...

However, I haven't yet confirmed whether putting the text in the description field will silence the email.

The other responses here mention the privacy usage descriptions in Info.plist, but this email is not directly related to this issue. Anyways, if you neglect to include those, your app will just crash when you try to access location services (unless permission had already been given in a pre-iOS 10 version of your app).

shim
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    Did you just start getting these emails? We did. We've been regularly updating the app. Last time in November, no emails. Now we are seeing these messages (January builds). – Fraggle Jan 05 '17 at 16:20
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    Yes, started recently. Must be a new change. Clearly useless, as practically no one reads app descriptions. Not like the App Store is really designed to highlight them anyway. – shim Jan 05 '17 at 16:22
  • Hm, just noticed I'm not getting them anymore. I don't think we changed anything. Possibly they fixed it? – shim Jan 17 '17 at 19:49