India Bans 118 Mostly Chinese Apps, Including PUBG

Simmering tension between India and China continues, with the news that New Delhi has banned a further 118 mobile apps, mostly from Chinese companies.

According to Reuters, India’s ban of 118 mobile apps includes China-based Tencent Holdings’s popular videogame PUBG Mobile.

The list of 118 mostly Chinese apps also reportedly includes applications from Baidu and Xiaomi’s ShareSave.

App ban

India and Chine have been at the centre of escalating tensions since June, after military forces of both countries clashed along the Sino-Indian border.

Fighting between the two nations in the region resulted in the deaths of 20 Indian soldiers (including an officer). China claimed 43 of its soldiers were hurt.

India then banned 59 Chinese apps, including ByteDance’s TikTok, Alibaba’s UC Browser and Xiaomi’s Mi Community app.

And now a further 118, mostly Chinese apps, have also been banned.

These “apps collect and share data in a surreptitious manner and compromise personal data and information of users that can have a severe threat to the security of the State,” India’s technology ministry was quoted as saying in a statement.

It added the apps threatened India’s sovereignty and integrity.

Tencent reportedly declined to comment, while the Chinese embassy in New Delhi did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Earlier this week India reportedly deployed troops on four strategic hilltops after what New Delhi called an attempted Chinese incursion along the disputed Himalayan border.