MetaMask Is Back On Google Play

This New Year was a double holiday for Ethereum (ETH) community, as Google Play brought back Ethereum browser and wallet MetaMask.

On January 1, MetaMask team tweeted the following:

“Upon careful consideration, Google has permitted The MetaMask mobile app back on the Google Play (Android) store! Thanks to all the believers in an open web for speaking out in our support!”

Google thought MetaMask to be a mining app

MetaMask is an extension which provides access to Ethereum DApps in Chrome and some other browsers. It also has a crypto wallet built in.

Banning MetaMask from Google Play app store, the company stressed on its policy against mining crypto on Android (which definitely does not concern MetaMask).

The news about the ban surfaced in Twitter on December 26, with the team stating that Google rejected their appeal.

This year thread started with thanks to users for providing suggestions as to alternative methods of distribution during the ban. The team said that the “experience has made us more resilient, and as a community, we are stronger for enduring it.”

Team under pressure

According to the December reports, one of MetaMask contributors said that the team lacks support from their parent company ConsenSys. He also stated that team’s workflow was neither transparent nor decentralized, and that the code of the extension is “of low quality, full of technical debt (both, in terms of code and architecture).”

MetaMask employee Daniel Finlay rebuted the claim, admitting, though, that criticism of the code may have a point. He also expressed thanks to ConsenSys and Joe Lubin for support.

Recent YouTube censorship

Last month other service operated by Google, YouTube, banned a large bunch of crypto-related channels, removing videos. They also claimed that it happened by mistake.