Apple caves to Chinese censorship

On the heels of a groveling apology to China for supposedly poor warranty and customer service—an odd complaint for a nation notorious for exporting toxic toys and other dubious wares—Apple has scrubbed an app that provided access to politically sensitive literature banned by the Community Party.

By Staff | April 4, 2013 | Last updated on April 4, 2013

1 min read

On the heels of a groveling apology to China for supposedly poor warranty and customer service—an odd complaint for a nation notorious for exporting toxic toys and other dubious wares—Apple has scrubbed an app that provided access to politically sensitive literature banned by the Communist Party, reports the Financial Times.

“Hao Peiqiang, the developer of an online bookstore app called ‘jingdian shucheng’, received a letter from Apple’s ‘App Review’ on Thursday morning telling him his app will be removed because it ‘includes content that is illegal in China’.

“Apple did not specify what content it was referring to, but Mr Hao told the Financial Times he believed the offending content consisted of three books by Wang Lixiong, the Chinese writer whose works are mostly banned in China,” the report says, adding the app only lists 10 titles, and is still available outside of China.

Read the rest here.

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