Apple Bows To Chinese Government Demand, Pulls NYT App From Store

The Chinese government is known for suppressing any kind of media coverage that’s critical of its practices and now, it has forced Apple to remove The New York Times’ app from the region’s App Store. By way of attempting to excuse its actions, the tech company told the American publication that it violated local regulations somehow or other.

By removing the app from the App store, Apple effectively took away one of the few remaining channels that Chinese readers of the publication had, save for VPNs and proxies, The New York Times reports. This effectively cut off any kind of global coverage free from Chinese government bias that they used to be able to get from the app.

According to the publications, the Chinese government began censoring its website and contents back in 2012 after releasing a series of articles relating to one of its most prominent figures. However, the app was a more difficult proposition because it wasn’t technically under their control. It would seem that this has changed since both the Chinese and English versions of the news app were taken down on December 23rd.

Apps from other news organizations were taken down as well, including those of the Financial Times and The Wall Street Journal. Apple spokesperson Fred Sainz tried to explain that The New York Times is no longer permitted to show its contents in the country.

“For some time now the New York Times app has not been permitted to display content to most users in China and we have been informed that the app is in violation of local regulations,” Sainz said. “As a result, the app must be taken down off the China App Store. When this situation changes, the App Store will once again offer the New York Times app for download in China.”

For its part, Apple has been fighting the Chinese government’s attempts at censorship for years, Tech Crunch reports. This has resulted in several of its products getting banned from the country as well.