With the growing revokes on Apple developer accounts signing sites that use these developer accounts to supply its customers with apps have to find new and creative ways to do so. From what I can see almost every signing site now offers a we buy your developer account program. For those who haven’t seen this it’s where you purchase a developer account and then sell it to the signing site to use to distribute apps.

Now there is 100 slots of each device type on this account. So if they are selling a membership at $20 that’s $2000 per device type. But we have to remember that iPods, iPads and Apple TVs rarely fill up. From experience I would say 20 of each give or take. iPhone will always fill up first. So let’s say a normal account will have 100 iPhones, 5 iPods, 20 iPads, and 20 Apple TVs. That’s a total of 145 devices per account. A grand total of $2900 per account at a $20 membership.

From what I have read they are offering $150 per account. Also remember that you have to turn over the username and password to this account you have sold. You also won’t be able to login to the account after you turn it over to the site because you could revoke the certificate. So most likely they will change the login information to lock you out. Also from experience the likelihood of your developer account being revoked is very high. Think about it like this. Apple has been revoking developer certificates for 3 years or so now. They have to have a way to see what is on the account or what the certificate is signing. So once that is triggered the account will be on a list and next revoke it will be revoked. Then that account will be banned for 2 years from being in the developer program. Now this is most likely a lifetime ban on that email and not the specific person even though they say it’s for 2 years. But this could hinder you from getting a account in the future if you ever wanted to join the developer program in a legit manner.

Personally I think buying a developer account for a site to use is a horrible idea, And you should avoid this. One of the main reasons it’s came to this is PayPal claims. The signing sites are liable for 180 days after purchase for a digital good. So if they up and closed shop the liability that would be over head is 6 months of sales that they could possibly have to reimburse via PayPal if they take that method of payment. Digital goods are not covered under PayPal’s seller coverage. So most of the time they will side with the buyer and give a refund. This doesn’t include the chargebacks done via banks. That’s a bigger liability, if the buyer used a bank to fund the money the buyer can go to the bank do a chargeback and the seller is hit with a $20 fee and the cost of the membership.

Now I am not telling you this so you will go and file PayPal claims on your signing service. I want you to see the whole picture of the codesigning community here. This is coming to a very fast and very messy end. The companies will want to protect their money that has already been spent and what they have in the bank. So if they can hold on for a few months and keep sales low and PayPal claims low they could close their doors leaving you with nothing and money gone. Now when I say nothing you most likely got something out of this purchase. Most likely you use a movie app or Jailbreak app of some type and you have got to use those features even if it was interrupted with revokes you still used them. So you didn’t get nothing exactly. But still you shouldn’t be under the impression that any company you paid money for a service has your best interests at heart. They care about the bottom line, the over all damage and liability of a closing business. And I tell you now this is where it’s going.

I know a lot of sites and people will be mad about this post. This post is very truthful and if any site claims it’s a lie they are just trying to cover up the truth of the matter. Apple has almost killed the abuse of it’s certificates.