Digital Desk: The Indian government is preparing to impose a ban on 54 Chinese apps that pose a security risk to the country.
The Union Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology said it had received a request from the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) to ban the 54 Chinese apps under Section 69(A) of the IT Act's emergency provision.
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According to the ministry, according to a report issued by the MHA, these apps are either cloned versions or have identical functionality, privacy problems, and security threats as alleged in previously blacklisted 267 apps by the Centre in 2020.
On June 29, 2020, the Centre prohibited 59 apps, followed by a restriction on 47 related/cloning apps on August 10, 2020. Following that, 118 apps were restricted on September 1, 2020, and another 43 apps were blocked on November 19, 2020.
According to the government, the 54 apps purportedly get a variety of critical permissions and harvest sensitive user data. "These obtained real-time data are being misused and sent to servers in hostile countries." This will allow them to amass massive amounts of personal data to mine, aggregate, analyze, and profile by elements antagonistic to India's sovereignty and integrity, as well as for acts damaging to national security," the IT ministry said in a statement.
"In addition, there are other serious concerns as some of these apps can carry out espionage and surveillance activities via camera/mic, accessing fine location (GPS) and do malicious network activity similar to previously blocked apps. These apps were allegedly engaged in activities prejudicial to the sovereignty and integrity of the country also posing serious threat to the security of the state and defence of India," it added.
The recent decision could be an example of how tensions between the two neighboring countries, who have been embroiled in a long-running border dispute, are affecting economic transactions.
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