Centre to impose permanent ban on 59 Chinese apps

New Delhi: The Centre on Monday issued fresh notices to make permanent a ban imposed on video app TikTok and 58 other Chinese apps. Earlier in June, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) had imposed a temporary ban on 59 Chinese mobile apps and had sought their response on compliance with privacy and security requirements

According to sources, the government is not satisfied with their responses to the show-cause notices

The Chinese apps under interim ban include ByteDance’s popular video-sharing app TikTok, Tencent Holdings’ WeChat and Alibaba’s UC Browser, Club Factory, SHAREit, Likee, Mi Video Call (Xiaomi), Weibo, Baidu, BIGO LIVE and Xiaomi’s Mi Community.

The ministry suspended access to the apps in India last year amid the border tussle with China. In its June order, the ministry had stated that these apps are engaged in activities which are prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of state and public order.

In September, India banned another 118 mobile apps, including Tencent’s popular videogame PUBG, as it stepped up the pressure on Chinese technology companies following the standoff at the border.