That’s got to be something legal or regulatory. Some sort of sanction like black list

I've been consistently saying this online - "app stores" and "developer programs" are all about control (and exploitation) and we developers need to consistently boycott it. There is a real need for us developers to form a Union and lobby for regulations to prevent such kind of abuse and exploitation by the BigTech. If we don't act now, it is going to be too late to do so. The onslaught against our rights and freedoms, by BigTech, is the beginning of a new form "digital imperialism" where we are only seen as "labour" and "consumer".

I also have hard feelings against the apple developer program. They prove to be incompetent and evil at all levels.

While android also has this problem (requiring a Developer account), it is not that bad, because you can still publish apps outside of the app store. Sadly Google is hard at work to remove this functionality.

As someone learning Japanese, that seems very much like an app I would want and love. I hope you are able to sort this out soon so I can buy it!

Also Igor, if you are reading this, your GitHub and LinkedIn icons in your sites header link to GitHub and LinkedIn's homepages rather than your profiles. Probably want to fix that ;)

I got the same thing trying to sign up for Oracle Cloud.

Thankfully Oracle aren't the only cloud platform, of course. Which makes it even more fun telling my friends and colleagues how shit Oracle Cloud are whenever the topic of cloud providers comes up even funnier.

On the other hand, Apple's position of dominance here makes their refusal to answer a GDPR subject access request all the more galling.

Just sign up with someone else's name.

Had this all the time before I changed my name.

It might be related to this repo: https://github.com/igorkulman/AppStoreCrawler

Apple’s terms explicitly prohibit using automated tools to scrape or analyze App Store data, even if it’s done outside an app. When they flag something like that, they usually don’t explain the reason — partly because they don’t want to expose how they evaluate developer activity or link accounts to external projects.

Not saying it’s definitely the cause, but it’s one plausible explanation the author was denied.

Register a company/business.

Get a business phone number, mailing address, and credit card.

You're going to have to publish your name, address, phone number, etc when you have an app published on the app store

If you want to get around the individual privacy issue of this, you'll need a business anyway.

Is the device you used for signing up previously used with another dev account? Is your payment method something that can be considered shady(i.e. single use or anonymous payment cards)?

If you call them, they will reset your status so you can try again but they will not tell you the reason. Try doing it on an Apple device that hasn't been used before with a dev account and make sure you are using a credit card on your name.

It's probably Apple trying to fight malicious developers but ending up blocking you.

Just one more reason to boycott Apple products

Who is Apple to decide if you can share your work or not, none of their business.

I managed to create a new Apple id with new email, new phone number, I had to use it on a real device to be able to get through payment. So far so good, lets see if I can actually publish the app.

For anyone interested in testing the app and providing feedback here is a TestFlight link https://testflight.apple.com/join/SHngHsGk