Apple: real-money gambling apps must now be iOS native

Technology giant Apple has thrown up a major hurdle for anyone looking to offer real-money gambling to iOS users.

On Monday, Apple issued updates to its App Store review guidelines, including this doozey:

HTML5 games distributed in apps may not provide access to real money gaming, lotteries, or charitable donations, and may not support digital commerce. This functionality is only appropriate for code that’s embedded in the binary and can be reviewed by Apple. This guideline is now enforced for new apps. Existing apps must follow this guideline by September 3, 2019.

In case anyone didn’t notice, September 3 is only two days before the new NFL season kicks off. Lucy Van Pelt couldn’t have pulled a football away more abruptly.