Apple allows self-censorship bittorrent app

Apple has approved an app that allows torrents to be downloaded to an iOS device. However, the app has an important limitation: it is only possible to download files from certain legal sources.

The Blue Downloader app, which recently appeared in the App Store, does not make it possible to download torrents from sites such as The Pirate Bay and Kickass Torrents. However, certain other BitTorrent sites such as Bitlove, Linuxtracker and Archive.org, where only legal content can be found, are supported.

The app deliberately does not mention support for the bittorrent protocol in its description and in its application name. Developer Harrison Tyler says in an interview with TorrentFreak that he decided to curtail the app’s functionality because he expected Apple not to approve the app otherwise. “I’m not normally for restrictions,” he says.

Apple normally does not allow bittorrent apps in the App Store, because they would facilitate illegal downloading, even though the protocol is also used to distribute open source software, for example. In 2010, an application was approved that made it possible to add torrents to Imageshack’s torrent service, but that app is no longer available.