India has banned 54 apps it says are of Chinese origin, including Sea Ltd’s (冬海) marquee game Free Fire, citing security concerns, people with knowledge of the matter said, in the latest instance of tensions between the two countries during a protracted border dispute.
The apps banned by the Indian Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology include those belonging to large Chinese tech firms such as Tencent Holdings Ltd (騰訊), Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴) and NetEase Inc (網易), and are rebranded versions of apps already banned by India in 2020, the sources said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Founded in Singapore by Chinese who became Singaporean citizens, Sea has been focusing on building a global gaming and e-commerce business with backing from Tencent, the largest shareholder of the company.
Free Fire, a battle royale shooter game often compared with PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, is among the world’s most popular mobile games, with more than 1 billion downloads on Google Play.
The title has underpinned the phenomenal growth of Sea, Southeast Asia’s most valuable company, and its expansion into markets from Brazil to India. The game was the highest-grossing mobile game in India in the third quarter of last year, industry tracker App Annie said.
While Tencent is Sea’s largest shareholder, it has adopted much the same hands-off approach it takes with its investment targets in China.
Last month, the WeChat operator revealed it was cutting its stake in Sea to 18.7 percent from 21.3 percent, while taking its voting rights eventually to under 10 percent.
India’s move comes as a long-running dispute between the two nuclear-armed nations remains unresolved, after boiling over in a bloody 2020 skirmish that left soldiers from both sides dead, and drew tougher laws in India for investments from China, including the original app ban.
India and China share an unmarked 3,488km-long border along the Himalayas, where thousands of troops, tanks and artillery guns from both countries have been massed.
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