Mainland restrictions to be lifted on Line and KakaoTalk, South Korean diplomat says
Access to them and other popular foreign social networks has recently been disrupted
The Chinese government has told the South Korean embassy that it would soon lift the restrictions it placed on the mobile messaging services Line and KakaoTalk, according to a Korean diplomat, but did not specify exactly when.
Access to them and other popular services such as Instagram has been severely disrupted in China for more than a month in what, analysts say, appears to be part of a clampdown on foreign social networks.
“The Chinese authorities have not lifted the blockage of KakaoTalk and Line, saying the situation is not resolved yet,” the diplomat was quoted as saying today by the Yonhap news agency.
Kakao and Naver, the two South Korean firms that run the apps, which can be downloaded almost anywhere there is internet access, said they did not know why their services were not running properly or when they would work again.
A Kakao spokesman said the problem involves blocked access to domains and is happening only in China. “We have to be careful in speculating about the possible causes,” he said.
Technology industry experts in South Korea told the website Business Korea that the Chinese government suspended the services of Line and KakaoTalk in order to protect domestic services and to prevent terrorist actions.
Jane Zhang, a Beijing-based analyst with Gartner consultancy firm, pointed out that the fact so many foreign messaging apps have become inaccessible means many Chinese users would indeed switch to domestic alternatives: WeChat and QQ.