China's largest instant messaging service provider, Tencent, apologised yesterday for hurting users' feelings by forcing them to choose between its service and Qihoo 360.
However, the company denied its software, QQ, had breached users' privacy and vowed to take further legal action against 'an unnamed company' which falsely accused it of prying into its users' computers.
Li Yizhong , minister of Industry and Information Technology, criticised both companies' recent actions as 'immoral' and 'irresponsible', according to a report by the China Daily. He said corporations should always take care of their ordinary consumers.
Tencent told users to uninstall a plug-in application of Qihoo's antivirus software 360 Safeguard from their computers last week or their QQ services would be suspended.
Tencent chairman Ma Huateng said yesterday that the company was caught between a rock and a hard place.
'We admitted Tencent had not fully protected users' benefits ... but to let the situation develop on its own risked leaking an enormous amount of user data to 360, and the result would be unthinkable. We could only choose between bad and not as bad,' Ma said.
'Time was so pressing we had to focus on working out the technical remedy, and we didn't communicate well with users and consider their perspectives. But in hindsight, I still can't think of any alternative way to handle the situation.'