Important Announcements!
Hi everyone,
Good day to you all.
Sorry to disturb, but I have two (2) announcements that I think is quite important for those who implement in-app purchases and in-app subscriptions in their mobile applications.
(1) PlayFab Receipt Validation Reminder
Just a reminder to those who are using the Mobile Billing plugin for in-application purchases with PlayFab's Server-Side Receipt Validation. Please make sure to fill-in the Service account key in the PlayFab Console > Addons > Google, if you haven't already.
If you already use in-app subscriptions with the Mobile Billing plugin with PlayFab's Server-Side Receipt Validation, then please ignore this reminder since this was already a prerequisite to integrating subscriptions with PlayFab.
For those who haven't yet, PlayFab now requires filling the service account key since 2021, no longer only for subscriptions but also for purchases as well, to prevent the potential pending payment fraud which started in the Google Billing Library v3 and still exists in v4 as well.
Notably, due the payment methods like Pay by cash which are adopted by some countries, like Indonesia and Malaysia.
(2) Google's Receipt Validation Requirement
Google now recommends the use of a server-side validator with Google's Server-Side Receipt Validation if you plan to continue implementing In-App Purchases and In-App Subscriptions in your applications. This is your only strongest protection and weapon to fight against payment frauds and abuse. The reason is related to the first announcement above.
If you don't have one yet, it is fine since you have a lot of options. One of them are the following:
1. If you use PlayFab, and if you also own the PlayFab Master Collection, you may easily use the Real Currencies plugin to validate purchases and subscriptions for both Android and iOS. The service is free if you have a PlayFab project, and the PlayFab service is also free for your project title's first 100K users, after that the pricing is scalable with pay-as-you-go, meaning pay only what you use.
Reference: constructcollection.com/construct-playfab-realcurrencies
2. There is also Fovea Billing, which is also quite easy to use, free for 100 receipts / month. Although, beyond that it is already paid, starting $9 / month for 5,000 receipts. However, it is still quite convenient to use, you only need to paste a validator url, and it validates purchases and subscriptions for both Android and iOS.
3. If you are quite tech savvy, you may also host your own server to implement the Google's and Apple's server-side receipt validation. You can find this in Google In-App Billing and Apple Store Kit's official documentation.
That's it, good luck everyone.