By Josh Ye and Mrinmay Dey
(Reuters) -Apple said on Friday it had removed Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:)’ WhatsApp and Threads from the App Store in China after being ordered to do so by the Chinese government, which raised national security concerns.
According to app tracking companies Qimai and AppMagic, Telegram and Signal – two other foreign messaging apps – were also removed from the store on Friday.
The removal of the four apps signals a growing intolerance on the part of China’s central government toward at least some foreign online messaging services outside its control. It also signals less room for Apple (NASDAQ:) in China.
That said, other Meta apps, including Facebook, Instagram and Messenger, remained available for download, Reuters checks showed on Friday. There were also many other popular apps available, developed by Western companies, including YouTube and X.
It was not immediately clear how WhatsApp or Threads could have caused security concerns for Chinese authorities.
“The Cyberspace Administration of China has ordered the removal of these apps from the Chinese storefront based on national security concerns,” Apple said in an emailed statement.
“We are obligated to follow the laws in the countries where we operate, even if we disagree with them,” the statement said.
Meta declined to comment and referred questions to Apple.
Apple did not respond to requests for comment on Signal and Telegram. Representatives for the two companies did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The Cyberspace Administration of China also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
None of the four apps are widely used in China, where Tencent’s WeChat is by far the dominant service.
These apps and many foreign apps are normally blocked on Chinese networks by the ‘Great Firewall’ – the country’s extensive censorship system – and can only be used with a virtual private network or other proxy tools.
The four apps remain available in Hong Kong and Macau, China’s two special administrative regions.
Some experts on China’s tech industry said the government order on WhatsApp and Threads could be linked to a new rule last August that requires all apps available in China to register with the government or risk to be removed.
The deadline for companies to complete registrations was the end of March and the regulations came into effect on April 1.
Apple previously removed apps from the Chinese app store.
In 2017, Apple removed The New York Times news app because it violated local regulations — a move that came amid rising news censorship in the world’s second-largest economy. The app is still not available in Apple’s Chinese App Store.
Last year, Apple removed a number of ChatGPT-like apps as Beijing moved to implement local regulations on generative artificial intelligence (AI) services.
The removal of WhatsApp and Threads from the Chinese App Store was first reported by The Wall Street Journal.
