Keeping Google Play & Android app ecosystems safe in 2025

Google outlines 2025 enhancements to Google Play and Android security, reporting AI-driven app review improvements, privacy safeguards, and anti-spam measures (e.g., blocking 160M spam reviews and preventing excessive data access in 255K apps). Play Protect now scans 350B apps daily, identified 27M malicious apps outside Play, and—with enhanced fraud protection expanded to 185 markets covering 2.8B devices—blocked 266M risky install attempts and helped protect against 872K unique high‑risk apps. Additional measures include in‑call scam protections, developer-first tools like Play Policy Insights, stricter pre‑review checks, strengthened Play Integrity API (with hardware-backed signals and device recall beta), broader developer verification, and Android 16 features to counter threats like tapjacking.