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Apple’s China App Store pulls US news app that covered Hong Kong protests
- Boss of American media firm Quartz says company is being targeted for reporting on dispute and providing information on how to bypass China’s Great Firewall
- Product removed on grounds it ‘includes content that is illegal in China’, CEO Zach Seward says
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An app produced by an American media company that has given extensive coverage to the protests in Hong Kong has become the latest to be removed from Apple’s App Store in mainland China, for providing “illegal content” in the country.
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Zach Seward, chief executive of Quartz, which reports on the global economy, said in an interview with technology news website TheVerge.com that his company was being targeted not only because of its reports about the pro-democracy protests but also its articles on how to use virtual private networks (VPNs) to bypass China’s strict controls on internet access.
As well as the removal of its app from the online shop, Quartz’s website – like those of many media and technology firms, including the South China Morning Post, The New York Times, The Guardian, the BBC, Google and Facebook – is blocked in mainland China.
“We abhor this kind of government censorship of the internet and have great coverage of how to get around such bans around the world,” Seward said in a statement.
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The Verge report said Quartz had been notified by Apple of the app’s removal on the grounds that it “includes content that is illegal in China”, but did not say when it happened.
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