India banned several Chinese apps due to threat to security

The central government has ordered a ban on 54 apps related to China. These apps include Garena Sovereign Fireplace, Xriver of Tencent and Onmyoji Enviornment of Netease. The government has blocked about 300 apps after tension and clashes on the border about two years ago with China.

Google told Devices 360 that after the government’s order, it has “temporarily blocked” the access of these apps from Play Store. A statement issued by the government stated, “These 54 apps had allegedly received important permissions and were collecting sensitive data of users. This data was being misused and was being misused and sent to servers present abroad. Some of these apps have serious apprehensions as they can do activities like espionage and mike.” Garena’s game Sovereign Fireplace can be said to be the most popular among the banned apps. Its app store has 1,84,700 ratings and more than 100 million downloads on Play Store.

To implement the ban, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology has ordered Google and Apple to block access to apps. Google spokesperson told Devices 360 through a statement, “After the order given under section 69A of the IT Act, we have informed the developers affected by it and these apps have been temporarily blocked.” There has been no comment from Apple about this. However, there is no access of apps banned on the app store in the country. Under section 69A of the IT Act, the government has the power to block the access of content through computing devices.

This is not the first time that the government has banned apps related to China in the country. Several apps, including tickets, shares, UC Browser and WeChat, were banned about two years ago after tension on the border with China. These also included the app of PUBG Cellular. This caused damage to Chinese companies associated with these apps. These companies also reduced the number of employees in India.