Apple recently began using computers to automatically scan for the use of private application programming interfaces. The new “static analysis tools” aim to catch those who might have snuck by the approval process before, with software that bends or breaks the rules established by Apple.

Private APIs have always been banned from use in iPhone software. But the rule was not entirely enforced because it can be difficult to determine when an API falls within the rules and when it does not.

With the new automated scan Apple hopes to catch more and more of these Apps, however, the scan is said to be far from perfect and produce false positives in some cases, for example when using the name of a private API method for ones own category method name.

Watch out! :)