App Store Binary Rejected - The seller and company names associated with your app do not reflect the name

I have recently uploaded a new application to iTunes Connect for the approval process. Its version is 1.0. Today the binary was rejected and the following was mentioned in the resolution center.

The seller and company names associated with your app do not reflect the name, “Secured” in the app or its metadata, as required by section 1.2 of the Apple Developer Program License Agreement.

Next Steps

Your app must be published under a seller name and company name that reflects the Secured brand. If you have developed these apps on behalf of a client, please advise your client to add you to the development team of their Apple Developer account.

Once created, you cannot change your seller name or company name in iTunes Connect. For assistance with changing your company name or seller name, you will need to contact iTunes Connect through the Contact Us page.

We have generated the application using the proper profiles. Any idea as to when this issue is raised by Apple? We could not get any proper information about the reason and the way to resolve it. Does this have anything to do with the application name being similar to some other application named as "Secured" and out app name being Secured?

Solution 1:

I found a comment in Apple Developer forum, and it works for me.

rajveer123 Mar 14, 2017 10:46 AM (in response to nikhileshrayapureddy)

Hi, I might be able to help on this. I just got my app approved and had the same reason. You need to make sure, that if your app is called XYZ and you are the owner 123, that 123 owns all copyright for the app and it's content within. If the content is third-party make sure you comment this in comments box. It's quite reasonable, as I might upload an app called Windows for iOS and do not even own the copyright for this brand. Also, make sure you write the correct name etc. in the copyright box, who owns the brand. It's not the app name, but the publisher or if you develop for someone, it's his company/client name. I don't think it's that complictaed with Apple, you just need to be straight forward. I hope this helps someone!

Link: https://forums.developer.apple.com/thread/73820

From the comment, I did as below:

• In "Prepare for submission", scroll to Copyright area, copy your team name and paste it as Copyright of this application.
  • Resubmit your application.

In my case, it took 2 days to get my application approved for sale in Apple store. Have your patience.

UPDATED: Now, apple allows us upload a certificate file to show their authentication of this app then we can use the our owner app name.

Solution 2:

You typically get this kind of rejection when you submit an app that has some known brand in the name of the app, icon, inside the app or in the metadata. For example, if your company is "Milkshakes Ltd." and you use "Nike" brand in the name of your app "Milkshakes - Nike Edition".

This typically happens when a company asks you - the developer - to create and app for them and you are trying to release the app under your developer account. But the app needs to be released under the company developer account (the company needs to enroll Apple Developer Program if it has not yet done so). That is why Apple advises the following:

If you have developed these apps on behalf of a client, please advise your client to add you to the development team of their Apple Developer account.

Releasing apps under a different account is against Apple Developer Program License Agreement:

For the sake of clarity, You may authorize contractors to develop Applications on Your behalf, but any such Applications must be owned by You, submitted under Your own developer account, and distributed as Applications only as expressly permitted herein. You are responsible to Apple for Your contractors’ activities under Your account (e.g., adding them to Your team to perform development work for You) and their compliance with this Agreement. Any actions undertaken by Your contractors arising out of this Agreement shall be deemed to have been taken by You, and You (in addition to Your contractors) shall be responsible to Apple for all such actions.

However, based on your description, it does not look this is your case. I don't know about any well known "Secured" or "Safe" brands. You did not write your company name, there might be a conflict too. I would try to clarify the issue with Apple Review Team by responding to the issue in Resolution Center. They might point you to the brand you are in conflict with. Or it might have been rejected by a mistake.

Solution 3:

We ran into the same issue. Basically it's a trademark issue. I'm not arguing if it's right or wrong. But the solution:

1. Either you have to list in the developer account of your customer.
2. Or legally acquire the trademark and brand name of your customer (may be limited for the purpose of AppStore/PlayStore/Digital Marketing)

I know point 2 sounds a bit off. I agree it is.

Let's take an example:

Developer: FooBar Software
App: No1 Pharma

In AppStore listing, the seller of the app is the developer. So from the user point of view, if you look at the listing on AppStore, it would say the app "No1 Pharma" is being sold by "FooBar Software". This doesn't sound right.

Another case:

The publishing rights of Harry Potter Books (acc. to wiki) is owned by Bloomsbury Publishing (UK) and Scholastic (US)

Developer: Bloomsbury Publishing
App: Harry Potter

This will sound right, in spite of the fact that the seller name and app name did not match. The listing would read "Bloomsbury Publishing" is the seller of the app "Harry Potter". This sounds right. So Bloomsbury can publish all the trademarks/brands it owns as different apps in it's developer account.

Perhaps AppStore might choose to differentiate the developers from sellers. Because developers are not sellers. That's the reality.

Let's say IBM develops the "Harry Potter" app for "Bloomsbury", then the listing should read:

Developer: IBM
Seller: Bloomsbury
App: Harry Potter

Hope this helps.

Solution 4:

I had the same issue. They accepted it after I changed the individual membership account to a company/Organisation membership & uploaded it again. If your product is a brand which is registered, it should be a company account which reflects the brand name of your product