Srinagar: The government of India on Wednesday blocked 118 more mobile applications, including PUBG, in the interest of “sovereignty and integrity of India, Defence of India, security of the state and public order” invoking Section 69 of Information Technology Act
According to a statement, “the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, GoI of India, invoking it’s power under section 69A of the Information Technology Act read with the relevant provisions of the Information Technology (Procedure and Safeguards for Blocking of Access of Information by Public) Rules 2009 and in view of the emergent nature of threats, has decided to block 118 mobile apps.”
Government Blocks 118 Mobile Apps Which are Prejudicial to Sovereignty and Integrity of India, Defence of India, Security of State and Public Order.
Press Release issued by @GoI_MeitY regarding blocking of 118 mobile apps https://t.co/VyahsHR5f0
— Ministry of Electronics & IT (@GoI_MeitY) September 2, 2020
The move, according to the statement was taken view of information available, that they are engaged in activities which is “prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defense of India, security of state and public order,”
The Ministry said that it 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 unauthorized manner to servers which have locations outside India.”
“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 statement said.
The Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre, Ministry of Home Affairs has also sent an exhaustive recommendation for blocking these “malicious” apps.
Likewise, there have been similar “bipartisan” concerns, flagged by various public representatives, both outside and inside the Parliament of India. “There has been a strong chorus in the public space to take strict action against Apps that harm India’s sovereignty as well as the privacy of our citizens,” the statement mentioned.
The statement added that on the basis of these and upon receiving of recent “credible inputs” that information posted, permissions sought, functionality embedded as well as data harvesting practices of above stated Apps raise serious concerns that these Apps collect and share data in “surreptitious manner and compromise personal data and information of users that can have a severe threat to security of the State.”
“In the interest of sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India and security of the State and using the sovereign powers, the Government of India has decided to block the usage of certain Apps, used in both mobile and non-mobile Internet enabled devices,” the statement added.
PUBG MOBILE Nordic Map: Livik, PUBG MOBILE LITE, WeChat Work and WeChat reading are among the 118 banned mobile apps.
In June this year, GoI had banned 59 apps with Chinese links, including TikTok, UC Browser and Weibo.
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