Google has now blocked Tik Tok in India as a result [0].
[0] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tiktok-india-court/google...
Less terrible site: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tiktok-india-court/indian...
Christ, that site is probably the worst ad-laden/features promos experience on mobile that I've seen.
Lol, I clicked the link hoping to read the article, got bombarded with a dozen pops and what not.
Then I was like, "ah Indiatimes, my mistake my mistake. I should have checked the link"
(I'm from India and I avoid Indian media sites like a plague)
They didn't explain the actual reason until literally the last sentence
The issue has to do more with culture than exposed children. The kulcha warriors are worried about exposure by women.
TikTok is one of a couple Chinese apps that have similar disturbing content in India. https://factordaily.com/chinese-app-kwai-turns-a-blind-eye-t...
AFAIK India is TikTok's second largest market after its native China.
There's big money at stake here. ByteDance, the company behind TikTok, is one of the most valuable private companies in the world: its last fundraising round was at a valuation of $75 billion USD.
Clicked link. Saw notification request and Google sign in. Left.
Anyone got a link to an APK that is safe to install?
TikTok is a Chinese application so I wonder if there are other interests at play.
But why would the government be in in involved in banning apps. Don't we have more important cases pending.
Telegram is a cess pool of piracy and porn. Wonder why the government is silent about that? Because it isn't e2e encrypted and the powers-that-be can mine data out of it? Spread propaganda?
The point is, where does the buck stop? After having forked the internet? The current right-wing Indian government is rampant with its moral policing both on the ground (banning beef, banning couples from having consensual sex unless they are married) and on the interwebs (banning games like PubG, banning porn, attacking free speech by indicting individuals speaking against the govt or the Prime Minister), so the current ban on TikTok suits the pattern to a tee.
The elections are on-going right now, and it'd be interesting to see if people vote back in the incumbent to power again. Now, that'd be some mandate and a GFW would be a well deserved eventual reward.
"ByteDance’s applications TikTok and Helo are hugely popular among India’s teen and pre-teen population, especially in smaller towns. Many Chinese apps, including TikTok, have come under fire not only in India but also in the US, the UK, Hong Kong and Indonesia for content that is often dangerously close to exposing children to nudity and possibly those who seek to coerce or groom underage users into committing explicit acts."
Saved you a click. The rest of the article is fluff.