We monitor 175 App Store storefronts to answer one question —
Is Vault* Free - Hidden Photo & Video Safe for iPhone, iPad & iPod Touch censored by Apple?
Vault* Free - Hidden Photo & Video Safe for iPhone, iPad & iPod Touch is gone from every App Store storefront we test. It was last seen available on Mar 22, 2019.
621 tests on record·last checked 2 months ago
Why it is unavailable
Five things can put an app out of one App Store. Each is weighed below against what can be seen from outside — open a card for the reasoning.
A government or a court demanded it
and Apple complied. Apple publishes a count of these per country each year and never says which apps they were. Apple's 2025 App Store Transparency Report
- Productivity apps in the United States are unavailable at 3%, near the 5% for everything there, which cuts neither way.
- 4 other apps left mainland China the same day, Oct 14, 2019.
- Apple reports 1,213 government-ordered removals in Russia for 2025, naming none of them.
Apple applied a rule, unasked
either its own review guidelines, or its own reading of a local law, with nobody having demanded anything. This is the largest category in Apple's own removal figures by a wide margin, and it covers distribution permits as well as content — Apple kept a free Bible app out of mainland China in 2021 for want of one. Apple's 2025 App Store Transparency Report
- Productivity apps in the United States are unavailable at 3%, near the 5% for everything there, which cuts neither way.
- 4 other apps left mainland China the same day, Oct 14, 2019.
The developer withheld it
freely, or under legal advice of their own, or because Apple's guidelines require that kind of app to be limited to certain countries. Switching a country off is easy for a developer to do in Apple's own tools: it needs no new version of the app, and it leaves no public trace other than the app being unavailable.
Something broke
a rejected update, a lapsed certificate, a payment or licensing problem, a mistake nobody has got round to noticing.
- 4 other apps left mainland China the same day, Oct 14, 2019.
- Gone for 6 years.
A local rule about paying for it
gambling licences, financial rules, tax — the kind of law that governs a transaction. Apple can obey every one of them by refusing the payment, which is why this is the only restriction we would accept and the only one that cannot touch a free app.
- It is free, so Apple sells nothing here.
How this is weighed, and what it cannot tell you
Weighed from the evidence under each card, not from a model. There is no published figure for how Apple's removals divide up, so these are ordered words rather than percentages. For scale on the same-day counts: across the whole record an app leaves a storefront with fewer than two others, so a dozen at once is not a dozen coincidences.
None of this is certain, and a citation does not make it so: Apple naming a Chinese agency tells you what Apple said, not everything that happened. What can be said is that the readings alone cannot separate these five — a developer switching off a country and a government ordering it removed arrive at Apple's catalogue looking identical — and that nobody has ever measured how they divide across the App Store. The one careful study of the question was done on Google's store, using an error message Apple does not emit.
Apple publishes no record of which apps are unavailable in which of its App Stores. For the removals it makes on a government's demand it publishes the agency and the law behind every one — 2,045 of the 166,899 apps it removed during 2025 — and never which app. Where a reason reaches the public at all, it is usually because a developer chose to say so. Apple's App Store Transparency Report
Know of a statement, notice or order we have missed? Tell us →
Vault* Free - Hidden Photo & Video Safe for iPhone, iPad & iPod Touch
Developer: T-bone, LLC · Category: Productivity · Released: Aug 31, 2010 · Rating: 2.8★
Other Productivity apps missing from mainland China
Life of this app
- Aug 31, 2010Released on the App Store
- Feb 26, 2019First tested by AppleCensorship
- Mar 22, 2019Last seen available anywhere
- Jan 21, 2022Gone from 104 storefronts
- Jul 11, 2026Most recent test
Testing history
One column per month, every month from the first reading to the last. Height follows how many readings we took that month; red is the share of them that found the app unavailable. An empty month is one nobody tested.
Found availableFound unavailable
Availability by storefront
Every storefront we test, current status first. Data is a measurement, not a promise: each row carries its own date.
| Test now | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AlbaniaAL | Unavailable | Dec 16, 2019 | 3 years ago | ||
| AlgeriaDZ | Unavailable | Oct 7, 2023 | 3 years ago | ||
| Antigua & BarbudaAG | Unavailable | Nov 13, 2020 | 4 years ago | ||
| ArgentinaAR | Unavailable | Jul 10, 2023 | 3 years ago | ||
| AustraliaAU | Unavailable | Nov 23, 2023 | 3 years ago | ||
| AustriaAT | Unavailable | Nov 22, 2020 | 3 years ago | ||
| BahamasBS | Unavailable | Sep 23, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| BahrainBH | Unavailable | Apr 19, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| BarbadosBB | Unavailable | Apr 6, 2023 | 3 years ago | ||
| BelarusBY | Unavailable | Jul 11, 2026 | 2 months ago | ||
| BelizeBZ | Unavailable | Aug 27, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| BeninBJ | Unavailable | Mar 18, 2022 | 3 years ago | ||
| BhutanBT | Unavailable | Mar 30, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| BoliviaBO | Unavailable | Oct 14, 2019 | 3 years ago | ||
| BrazilBR | Unavailable | Dec 5, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| British Virgin IslandsVG | Unavailable | Nov 28, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| BruneiBN | Unavailable | Mar 30, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| BulgariaBG | Unavailable | Dec 8, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| Burkina FasoBF | Unavailable | Jun 1, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| CambodiaKH | Unavailable | Mar 12, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| ChadTD | Unavailable | Feb 1, 2025 | 2 years ago | ||
| China (Mainland)CN | Unavailable | Oct 14, 2019 | 2 months ago | ||
| Costa RicaCR | Unavailable | Dec 8, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| Côte d’IvoireCI | Unavailable | May 8, 2023 | 2 years ago | ||
| CroatiaHR | Unavailable | Dec 11, 2024 | 2 years ago | ||
| CzechiaCZ | Unavailable | Dec 8, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| DenmarkDK | Unavailable | Mar 12, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| DominicaDM | Unavailable | Apr 13, 2024 | 2 years ago | ||
| Dominican RepublicDO | Unavailable | Dec 6, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| DR CongoCD | Unavailable | Jun 23, 2022 | 4 years ago | ||
| EcuadorEC | Unavailable | Aug 31, 2021 | 12 months ago | ||
| El SalvadorSV | Unavailable | Oct 14, 2021 | 2 years ago | ||
| EstoniaEE | Unavailable | Mar 18, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| FijiFJ | Unavailable | Mar 30, 2023 | 3 years ago | ||
| GabonGA | Unavailable | Feb 16, 2024 | 3 years ago | ||
| GermanyDE | Unavailable | Jan 17, 2025 | 2 years ago | ||
| GhanaGH | Unavailable | Apr 19, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| GrenadaGD | Unavailable | Jan 28, 2022 | 3 years ago | ||
| GuatemalaGT | Unavailable | Sep 17, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| Guinea-BissauGW | Unavailable | Jun 10, 2024 | 2 years ago | ||
| GuyanaGY | Unavailable | Jul 2, 2026 | 3 months ago | ||
| Hong KongHK | Unavailable | Oct 27, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| HungaryHU | Unavailable | Nov 22, 2020 | 4 years ago | ||
| IrelandIE | Unavailable | Jun 21, 2023 | 3 years ago | ||
| IsraelIL | Unavailable | Sep 23, 2020 | 4 years ago | ||
| JamaicaJM | Unavailable | Mar 30, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| KenyaKE | Unavailable | Aug 20, 2023 | 3 years ago | ||
| LatviaLV | Unavailable | Mar 14, 2021 | 4 years ago | ||
| LebanonLB | Unavailable | Oct 14, 2019 | 3 years ago | ||
| LithuaniaLT | Unavailable | Oct 7, 2023 | 3 years ago | ||
| LuxembourgLU | Unavailable | Dec 5, 2021 | 4 years ago | ||
| MadagascarMG | Unavailable | Jan 21, 2022 | 4 years ago | ||
| MalaysiaMY | Unavailable | Dec 8, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| MaliML | Unavailable | Apr 13, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| MaltaMT | Unavailable | Apr 19, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| MauritiusMU | Unavailable | Apr 20, 2022 | 4 years ago | ||
| MicronesiaFM | Unavailable | Apr 10, 2020 | 3 years ago | ||
| MoldovaMD | Unavailable | Jul 7, 2021 | 2 years ago | ||
| MongoliaMN | Unavailable | Dec 5, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| MontenegroME | Unavailable | Jul 22, 2024 | 2 years ago | ||
| MontserratMS | Unavailable | May 14, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| MoroccoMA | Unavailable | Jun 27, 2022 | 4 years ago | ||
| NamibiaNA | Unavailable | Sep 23, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| NauruNR | Unavailable | Jul 7, 2024 | 2 months ago | ||
| NepalNP | Unavailable | Mar 12, 2021 | 2 years ago | ||
| NetherlandsNL | Unavailable | Jan 30, 2022 | 3 years ago | ||
| New ZealandNZ | Unavailable | Aug 16, 2022 | 4 years ago | ||
| NicaraguaNI | Unavailable | May 21, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| NigerNE | Unavailable | Oct 20, 2021 | 2 years ago | ||
| NigeriaNG | Unavailable | Apr 20, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| NorwayNO | Unavailable | Sep 21, 2021 | 2 years ago | ||
| OmanOM | Unavailable | Jul 18, 2022 | 4 years ago | ||
| PanamaPA | Unavailable | Oct 10, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| Papua New GuineaPG | Unavailable | May 21, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| PeruPE | Unavailable | Feb 28, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| PhilippinesPH | Unavailable | Jan 23, 2024 | 3 years ago | ||
| Republic of the CongoCG | Unavailable | Sep 21, 2021 | 2 years ago | ||
| RussiaRU | Unavailable | Mar 12, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| RwandaRW | Unavailable | Aug 16, 2022 | 4 years ago | ||
| Saudi ArabiaSA | Unavailable | Oct 28, 2020 | 3 years ago | ||
| SeychellesSC | Unavailable | Nov 13, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| SlovakiaSK | Unavailable | Dec 16, 2019 | 2 years ago | ||
| Solomon IslandsSB | Unavailable | Aug 8, 2021 | 4 years ago | ||
| South AfricaZA | Unavailable | Sep 17, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| SpainES | Unavailable | Nov 20, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| Sri LankaLK | Unavailable | Jul 7, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| St. LuciaLC | Unavailable | Jun 7, 2022 | 3 years ago | ||
| SurinameSR | Unavailable | Jun 1, 2021 | 2 years ago | ||
| SwedenSE | Unavailable | Sep 23, 2020 | 3 years ago | ||
| TaiwanTW | Unavailable | Mar 30, 2023 | 3 years ago | ||
| TanzaniaTZ | Unavailable | Apr 19, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| Trinidad & TobagoTT | Unavailable | Aug 31, 2021 | 3 years ago | ||
| TunisiaTN | Unavailable | Oct 27, 2020 | 3 years ago | ||
| TürkiyeTR | Unavailable | Oct 9, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| Turks & Caicos IslandsTC | Unavailable | Aug 8, 2021 | 4 years ago | ||
| UkraineUA | Unavailable | Mar 12, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| United Arab EmiratesAE | Unavailable | Dec 6, 2020 | 2 months ago | ||
| United KingdomGB | Unavailable | Nov 20, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| United StatesUS | Unavailable | Oct 14, 2019 | 2 months ago | ||
| UruguayUY | Unavailable | May 14, 2022 | 2 years ago | ||
| VanuatuVU | Unavailable | May 8, 2024 | 2 years ago | ||
| VenezuelaVE | Unavailable | Dec 21, 2022 | 4 years ago | ||
| VietnamVN | Unavailable | Apr 10, 2020 | 3 years ago | ||
| ZimbabweZW | Unavailable | Oct 9, 2020 | 2 years ago | ||
| AfghanistanAF | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| AngolaAO | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| AnguillaAI | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| ArmeniaAM | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| AzerbaijanAZ | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| BelgiumBE | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| BermudaBM | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| Bosnia & HerzegovinaBA | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| BotswanaBW | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| CameroonCM | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| CanadaCA | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| Cape VerdeCV | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| Cayman IslandsKY | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| ChileCL | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| ColombiaCO | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| CyprusCY | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| EgyptEG | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| EswatiniSZ | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| FinlandFI | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| FranceFR | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| GambiaGM | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| GeorgiaGE | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| GreeceGR | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| HondurasHN | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| IcelandIS | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| IndiaIN | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| IndonesiaID | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| IraqIQ | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| ItalyIT | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| JapanJP | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| JordanJO | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| KazakhstanKZ | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| KosovoXK | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| KuwaitKW | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| KyrgyzstanKG | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| LaosLA | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| LiberiaLR | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| LibyaLY | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| MacaoMO | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| MalawiMW | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| MaldivesMV | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| MauritaniaMR | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| MexicoMX | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| MozambiqueMZ | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| Myanmar (Burma)MM | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| North MacedoniaMK | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| PakistanPK | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| PalauPW | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| ParaguayPY | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| PolandPL | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| PortugalPT | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| QatarQA | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| RomaniaRO | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| São Tomé & PríncipeST | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| SenegalSN | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| SerbiaRS | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| Sierra LeoneSL | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| SingaporeSG | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| SloveniaSI | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| South KoreaKR | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| St. Kitts & NevisKN | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| St. Vincent & GrenadinesVC | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| SwitzerlandCH | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| TajikistanTJ | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| ThailandTH | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| TongaTO | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| TurkmenistanTM | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| UgandaUG | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| UzbekistanUZ | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| YemenYE | Not tested | — | — | 0 | |
| ZambiaZM | Not tested | — | — | 0 |
Testing asks Apple whether it will sell this app in that storefront, right now, by the same method the crawler has used since 2019. Your browser asks Apple directly, so the answer describes what Apple serves your connection — and if your browser cannot reach Apple at all, we ask on your behalf and say so. The result is a link: open it to see Apple's own answer and check ours. Readings are added to the record above; roughly a quarter of the readings taken each day come from people testing.
How we test
Availability is checked against Apple's own catalog servers for every storefront, the same way the App Store app asks. "Unavailable" means Apple's servers say the app cannot be offered in that country — it does not say who asked for the removal. Removals initiated by the developer and removals demanded by governments look the same from outside; the history and context on this page are how we tell them apart.