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Game page quarantined for unknown reason - need help :(

A topic by BubbleBloat created 6 days ago Views: 183 Replies: 4

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Hello !
I ran into a major problem recently when updating my last game on itch.io.... I really need help 😭

The problem :
My last game got "quarantined" by itch.io soon after I updated it (~3 days ago). The game can both be played in browser and downloaded for desktop. Soon after the last game update, it got removed from search on the itch.io store.
➡️ A screenshot of the message displayed upon clicking "download" is attached below.

Additionnal info :

Game title is "Brewing cat" (my games are for a niche audience so I wouldn't recommend playing.... Reason why I wont put a direct link here either).
I did read through other forum posts as well as this link https://itch.io/docs/creators/getting-indexed. I didn't find any specific answer about what to do for "quanrantined" pages, and I did wait 3 days before making this post (if the review of a "quarantined" page takes more time, then it's not precised in this link).
The game was made with Contruct 3 (last version). A popular and trusted 2D game engine.
The desktop versions got exported as NW.js executable. I can share the export settings I used within Construct 3 if that can help.
VirusTotal doesn't give any malware result when scanning the executable.
The game can trigger a windows defender popup upon trying to run the .exe (I added a screenshot), but it doesn't happen on all devices (tried myself on different computers)... That being said I don't know the % of devices on which it triggers the windows defender popup.
I know that my previous games can trigger a windows defender popup as well, yet their pages didn't get quarantined (games are "Feed the Dragon" and "Wyverns & Dragons" - both made with Gdevelop engine)... So I guess the windows defender popup is probably unrelated to the page being quarantined...?

Context :

The game was published the 30th of august, and the update that may have caused the issue was on 8th September (although I'm not even 100% sure the update is the cause, so far it may still be a coincidence but that would be very unlikely).
The game is free and got around 8k downloads without such problem during the first launch week until the page got flagged (~1 or 2 hours after updating the game, I don't remember exactly).
The game is not digitally signed (which partially explains the windows defender popup upon running the .exe). However I've been told it costs money to do it, so I want to be 100% sure it would solve the problem before trying this solution - or at least br sure it would prevent it from happening again in the future.
Here is a link about digitally signing apps : https://shorturl.at/4VcIz

Last thing I'd like to say it that the "quarantined" message doesn't show up for me, only for other people who go to the game page. I don't know if it's intended to be this way or not - I hope not, because it does make troubleshooting much harder. In addition to that, itch.io itself doesn't notify the page owner that the game is removed from search & browse...... Which makes everything harder and a bit frustrating. It's a bit overwhelming when you suddenly get a user comment saying that "your game is quarantined" and disappeared from the shop, cutting most of the visibility on something you spent several fulltime weeks of work on.

Screenshots :
message displayed upon clicking "download" button

Windows Defender popup (tho as said earlier it's maybe unrelated?)

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hechelion6 days ago (1 edit)

This topic has been discussed several times on the forum.

Long story short, the server automatically quarantined the game. Normally, it will be reviewed by someone on staff after a while.

If the person reviewing it confirms that there is nothing wrong (a false positive), the game will be removed from quarantine and everything will go back to normal.

What exactly triggers this? It has never been discussed publicly, to prevent bad actors from trying to take advantage. So there is not much we as developers can do except wait.

You can try to contact support and send any information that might help them, but you must contact support, as this forum is answered by the community and not by Itch support.

Edit:

Having the application signed does not guarantee anything, it can help prevent the Microsoft security window from appearing, but it does not guarantee that you will not trigger the Itch quarantine again.

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BubbleBloat6 days ago (1 edit)

And there is really no way to prevent this from happening ? For instance isn't there any way to post the game update files in advance to check whether the detection algorithm "approves" the files or not ?
As a more concrete example : On youtube I think it's possible to first keep a video private for some time so that the algorithm can check it first to make sure it can be monetized. Then only the creator makes his video public, and the algorithm check was already done so he knows there shouldn't be any problem. I'm wondering if something similar would be possible here.

I understand their detection algorithm obviously can't be disclosed, but it's kind of a problem to have the page completely cut from its visibility for creators, especially soon after launch. And that's without mentionning the creepy warning for viewers + it discloses "connected regions" of the page owner which is concerning for privacy as well.

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hechelion5 days ago

As far as I understand and what has been discussed in other posts, no, there is no way to prevent this.

As you noticed, Itch does not inform you if your game is quarantined, so uploading it privately first would not do you any good, because you would not know if the game was approved or not.

Also, not knowing the algorithm, we also do not know if it is influenced by users, for example, a sudden increase in downloads, maybe a group of people reported it, etc.

I understand how frustrating it is if you are a legitimate developer, but without data from Itch I cannot say if the measures are good or bad.
I assume that they do not inform you to prevent bad actors from automating processes that seek to break Itch's system and I assume that the cases of false positives will be a small number compared to the benefit they bring.

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BubbleBloat5 days ago

Page is finally back ! Thank you very much for your answers.

Really wish there was a way to prevent this, I guess I'll just have to pray that each new update goes fine now (or just not update recently released games at all).

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