India’s ban of 118 apps including PUBG Mobile, Alipay is ‘economic retaliation’ for border tensions: analysts

India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology cites national security and data security concerns as reasons for the latest ban

But analysts say it is an ‘economic retaliation’ for border tensions and signal that no Chinese apps are welcome in the country

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Tencent Holdings’ hit mobile game PUBG Mobile was among 118 Chinese mobile apps India blocked on Wednesday. Photo: AFP

Published: 10:34am, 3 Sep 2020Updated: 3:52pm, 4 Sep 2020

Corrected [12:26pm, 4 Sep, 2020]

[12:26pm, 4 Sep, 2020]
An earlier version of this story quoted Dev Lewis as saying that the India government used a section of the Intellectual Property (IP) Act in India to block the apps. He was, in fact, referring to the Information Technology (IT) Act. We apologise for the error.

India’s latest ban of 118 Chinese mobile apps – including Tencent Holdings’ hit mobile game PUBG Mobile , Chinese search engine Baidu and Ant Group’s mobile payment app Alipay – is an “economic retaliation” for border tensions between the two nuclear powers and signal that no Chinese apps are welcome in the country, analysts said.

The apps affected by the latest ban also include NetEase’s popular game MARVEL Super War, Alibaba’s online marketplace Taobao and video platform Youku, dating app Tantan and leading Chinese live-streaming platform Huya.

(Ant Group, which runs Alipay, is an affiliate of the Post’s parent company Alibaba Group Holding.)

In a statement on Wednesday, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology said it decided to ban these apps “in view of information available they are engaged in activities which are prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of state and public order”.

“The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology has received many complaints from various sources including several reports about misuse of some mobile apps available on Android and iOS platforms for stealing and surreptitiously transmitting users’ data in an unauthorised manner to servers which have locations outside India,” the authority added.

The latest move comes after India banned 59 Chinese apps including ByteDance’s TikTok and Tencent’s WeChat in June, following a deadly Himalayan border clash between China and India. This week, Bloomberg reported that thousands of Indian soldiers captured high ground near the country’s disputed border with China in a stealth nighttime operation – India’s first offensive move since the conflict began in May.

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