Apple Inc is now removing various Virtual Private Networks ( VPNs) services from its Chinese app store under the pressure from the Chinese government. Popular VPNs recently received a notice from Apple regarding the removal of their software from the App Store. The notice says that their services and content is illegal in China and therefore will be removed.
VPN providers accuses Apple
According to TechCrunch, many VPN service providers accused Apple of bowing to the pressure from Beijing and is supporting strict cyberspace regulations. The population of China largely relies on these VPN services to access blocked as well as global content.
And in such a case, the harsh cyberspace regulations will give them a hard time.
ExpressVPN called this step a drastic measure by the Chinese government and criticized Apple's support of this decision. They condemn both the Chinese government act and Apple's supporting efforts.
Another service provider, StarVPN also updated its large base of users on Twitter about the Apple's notice. Apple is remaining completely silent on this matter and has already declined to speak on this issue.
For those Chinese users with a billing address in another country, you can take a deep breath for now because you can still access VPN apps from other branches of the app store. Most likely this service will also be dead soon but until then you can enjoy surfing the whole web.
Beijing dominance over Apple
Apart from the VPNs, Apple is working on more stuff under the pressure of the Beijing. Apple recently named the new managing director for China in its latest move to localize product features. The localization is happening to meet the China's new cyber regulations.
Apple is also planning to establish new data centers with a local partner in the southwestern province of Guizhou.
That means all of the Chinese data will be stored in the Chinese data center and this was again decided on to meet the new Chinese cloud storage regulations.
So what now?
Clearly, China wants to control every single thing from the internet to data of their population. From the beginning, the Chinese government has always wanted to have a tight hold on its citizens.
All of this means the death of Free Internet which most of the American companies opposes. Controlling what every citizen will watch and their data is a clear threat to their security and privacy. In the past, the Chinese government forced other companies to change their products according to their demands.
And the most important question is what Apple is going to do next? Will they sit back and see the death of free internet in China? or will other fellow companies pressure Apple to take some big step on the matter?
