India bans 118 Communist China's Spying Apps
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The Indian government, on Wednesday, decided to exclude 118 mobile gaming applications distributed by Communist China's firms including PUBG, Baidu, Tencent and Xiaomi, the Ministry of Electronics said in a statement.
Delhi cited the misuse of the apps for stealing and unauthorised transmission of users' data to servers located outside India as a reason for the ban.
"In view of information available they are engaged in activities which is prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of state and public order", wrote the author of the statement on behalf of Ministry of Electronics.
The statement said the government consulted decision with the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre of the Ministry of Home Affairs.
"The compilation of these data, its mining and profiling by elements hostile to national security and defence of India, which ultimately impinges upon the sovereignty and integrity of India, is a matter of very deep and immediate concern which requires emergency measures."
The CamCard Business Card Reader, WeChat reading, Tencent Weiyun, and Baidu Express Edition were also banned.
The Economic Times, India's financial news daily, reported last month that the government has prepared a list of 275 more Chinese apps including PUBG, which could be banned on concerns of data security.
India is its largest market for Communist China's PUBG platform generating about 175 million installs to date, or 24% of the total downloads, according to app intelligence firm Sensor Tower estimate.
The ban follows similar decision made in August regarding 59 other apps.