BEIJING, June 29 (TMTPOST) -- India banned on Monday 59 applications developed by Chinese firms, accusing these apps of being “prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, and security of state and public order”.

The move comes after a recent border clash between the world’s two most populated countries. Chinese and Indian soldiers had a bloody conflict in China-controlled Galwan Valley in early June.

ByteDance’s overseas users-oriented app TikTok, with India as its largest market, Community and Video Call apps from Xiaomi, which has the largest market share in India, and WeChat are among the dozens of apps which the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology of India targeted.

The ministry alleged that it had 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 ban will impact about one in three smartphone users in India. The dozens of Chinese apps had more than 500 million monthly active users in May. 27 of these banned were among the most popular 1,000 apps in India last month.

It’s unclear what exactly the “ban” implies and whether mobile operating system makers, and internet service providers are subject to the ban. All of the aforementioned apps are currently live on Google Play Store and Apple’s App Store in India, according to TechCrunch.

An anti-China sentiment has on the rise in India since early June. “Boycott China” has been trending on Twitter among Indians while a growing number of videos about damaging Chinese-made smartphones and other products were posted.

Chinese smartphone makers enjoy over 80% market share in India, the world’s second largest smartphone market after China in terms of the number of users.

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