It's not documented or in the public headers. Meaning you do have to do a bit of fiddling in your app, but that just amounts to using reflection to use the API.
Just because an API is private doesn't mean it's privileged. Indeed, many once private APIs have later become public. Apple does scan the binaries that are uploaded for private API use, effectively banning them from the store.
One of the main reasons for banning use of private APIs is that those are usually in flux. They're not release worthy, and the last thing any platform maker, be they Apple, Google, or Microsoft, wants, is for a private change to break a bunch of 3rd party apps. These private APIs might also be doing things that they don't want just anyone to be able to do.
It's hard to believe you have ever used YouTube, Netflix or Google Play TV in a small country. For current TV shows, your options are usually to watch them as they air, or not watch them at all.
This even includes stuff for which Netflix is the original distributor, like House of Cards, because they may have licensed the content exclusively to a broadcast TV station.
I you do a job for me, and I don't pay you, then most people will agree that I really ought to pay you, and that you were wronged and that I am morally and legally obliged to mend my ways. You could convincingly explain that situation to a five-year old.
Now consider the perspective of someone who has the disposable income to pay for digital content, and is willing to support content producers, but gets told that his $10 is not as good as the $10 from someone from another country with a similar standard of living. This is acceptable with physical goods, where transport and stock have to be taken into account, but with digital content and today's Internet speeds it is hard to garner any sympathy.
So we are left with a choice: don't watch that show, or download it illegally and watch it. It is quite hard to convince people that by downloading the show illegally, you are now depriving a content owner in some foreign country of income by not being able to sell the local rights to that content for as good a price to a local distributor; if one can be found at all, who might sell that content to you in your country, or not, or only for a much higher price on DVD or BluRay, depending on their whim and abstract factors such as the local digital content market and the actions of competitors, and…
Good luck convincing these new pirates of their moral wrong.
Another 3 seconds will reveal that your thinking is similar to the justification used for spending public money on stadiums, and giving tax breaks for movie filming. Both of which have been proven to have negative effects on the local economies.
There's the added costs for those additional people in terms of traffic congestion, schools, and other services. There's also the lack of a guarantee that GE will stay long enough, or that they won't demand an even bigger tax break when this one expires.
Just because an API is private doesn't mean it's privileged. Indeed, many once private APIs have later become public. Apple does scan the binaries that are uploaded for private API use, effectively banning them from the store.
One of the main reasons for banning use of private APIs is that those are usually in flux. They're not release worthy, and the last thing any platform maker, be they Apple, Google, or Microsoft, wants, is for a private change to break a bunch of 3rd party apps. These private APIs might also be doing things that they don't want just anyone to be able to do.