The Indian government, which banned 224 Chinese apps in three rounds in 2020, has now issued fresh orders to ban around 54 Chinese apps, many of which belong to large companies such as Alibaba and Tencent and have resurfaced in a new avatar Indian government issues fresh orders to ban 54 Chinese apps
The union government has issued fresh orders to ban over 54 Chinese apps, terming them a threat to the privacy and security of Indians, officials aware of the development told us. New avatars: Many of these apps belong to large Chinese tech firms such as Tencent, Alibaba and gaming firm Net ease, and are "," rebranded or rechristened avatars & an official said; of apps that have been banned in India since 2020
• The ministry of electronics and IT issued the latest ban order because these apps were transferring the sensitive data of Indians to servers in foreign countries such as China.
• It has also directed top app stores including Google Play Store to block these applications. ''" The 54 apps have already been blocked in India on the Play Store, & an official said.
• May used its powers under Section 69a of the Information Technology Act, 2000 to enforce the order
224 apps banned:
Since June 2020, the government has banned a total of around 224 Chinese apps.
- The first round of bans covered 59 apps including popular applications such as TikTok, Share WeChat, Hello, Like, UC News, Bingo Live, UC Browser, ES File Explorer, and Mi Community.
- In November, another 43 Chinese apps were banned, including Snack Video, AliExpress and Alipay Cashier.
- In September, the government banned another 118 apps.
According to a new report, the Indian government has issued a fresh order to ban more than 54 Chinese apps under Section 69a of the Information Technology Act, 2000. While the list of the apps hasn’t been revealed yet, the report suggests that these apps are from major Chinese tech firms like Tencent, Alibaba, gaming company Net case, among others.
The ET report states that most of these 54 Chinese apps are ", rebranded or rechristened avatars"" of apps banned in 2020. To recall, in 2020, the government of India banned hundreds of Chinese apps including some popular ones like PUBG Mobile, PUBG Mobile Lite, TikTok, Camscanner, among others. These banned Chinese apps are no longer accessible in the country.
Fresh ban on Chinese apps
At the issue of the new order, the ministry of electronics and IT said that these Chinese apps were transferring the sensitive data of Indians to foreign servers in China. "The 54 apps have already been blocked from being accessed in India through the Play Store, & an official close to the development told the publication.
The report suggests that most of these 54 Chinese apps are cloned versions of already banned applications. A senior official close to the development said, ", many of the apps from the stable of Tencent and Alibaba, have changed hands to hide ownership. They are also being hosted out of countries like Hong Kong or Singapore, but the data was ultimately going to servers in Chinese destinations
Even apps such as ByteDance-owned TikTok and Tencent WeChat were available for download through alternative means such as APK files, and the government has taken cognizance of the official notes.
As per an ANI report, the 54 Chinese apps include Beauty Camera: Sweet Selfie HD, Beauty Camera – Selfie Camera, Equalizer & Bass Booster, Cam Card for a sales force, ENT, Island 2: Ashes of Time Lite, Viva Video Editor, Tencent Driver, emoji Chess, emoji Arena, AdBlock, Dual Space Lite;
Is Free Fire banned in India?
In a recent development, the Free Fire app has been removed from the As well as Apple App Store. The app was taken down from the app stores on January 12. Galena or Google and Apple have not commented on the matter yet. The Free Fire Max app has also been removed from the Apple App store, but it is available on the Play store. There is no confirmation on whether the battle royale game has been blocked in the country. Some reports suggest that the Free Fire app has been delisted due to technical issues.
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