China Expanding Government iPhone Ban

China earlier this week banned government officials from using iPhones and other foreign smartphones for work or from bringing such devices to their government offices, and now China is expanding the ban. According to Bloomberg, multiple state agencies and state companies have started telling workers not to bring their iPhones in to their jobs.

iPhone 14 Pros in Hand Black Background Feature
The restriction is expected to expand to additional government-controlled organizations in the future as China aims to block foreign technology. China does not yet have a formal injunction, so it is not yet known how many companies may adopt the iPhone restrictions. China has a huge number of state-owned enterprises in power generation, seaport construction, mining, manufacturing, education, and investment markets. Foreign devices have historically been discouraged in sensitive agencies, but China is now taking a firmer stance.

China is an important market for Apple, and the ban could push customers to purchase Chinese-made devices if they are unable to use their personal iPhones for much of the day. Bloomberg suggests that the strictness of the bans could vary from company to company, with some banning Apple products from the workplace and some preventing employees from using Apple devices entirely.

Apple stock has been dropping since yesterday, and it is down over 5 percent as of Thursday.

Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Tag: China

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Top Rated Comments

sparkinstx Avatar
19 months ago
Apple should run a TV ad promoting this as a selling point. "The iPhone is so secure that the Chinese government doesn't allow their employees to bring one to work. Security. That's iPhone."
Score: 101 Votes (Like | Disagree)
iZac Avatar
19 months ago
How else will they surveil party members without root access to their Huawei devices?
Score: 50 Votes (Like | Disagree)
NEPOBABY Avatar
19 months ago

I don't think they realize this won't have the intended effect on US politicians.

The right sees Apple as a "woke" company.

The left sees Apple as an evil mega-corp.

All this is going to accomplish is accelerate Apple's withdrawal from Chinese manufacturing.
It's just sabre rattling by the CCP. They do this often to manipulate markets and play the patriotism card. It's nonsense. Last week they were yelling at Japan for releasing tritium very slowly over the next 30 years but China releases a hundred times more tritium into the sea in just one year.

They gamble on markets. They manipulate markets. They have sovereign funds. Whenever you see dictator regimes rattle their sabres they are just trying to move numbers up and down.
Score: 41 Votes (Like | Disagree)
macduke Avatar
19 months ago
I don't think they realize this won't have the intended effect on US politicians.

The right sees Apple as a "woke" company.

The left sees Apple as an evil mega-corp.

All this is going to accomplish is accelerate Apple's withdrawal from Chinese manufacturing.
Score: 22 Votes (Like | Disagree)
robertmorris2 Avatar
19 months ago
time to get out of china.
Score: 21 Votes (Like | Disagree)
sw1tcher Avatar
19 months ago

How else will they surveil party members without root access to their Huawei devices?
China doesn't need root access when they have control of Apple's data centers and easy access to user data

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/17/technology/apple-china-privacy-censorship.html

Over two decades, Apple built the world’s most valuable company on top of China. It now assembles nearly all of its products in the country and generates a fifth of its sales there. In turn, the Chinese government has pressured Apple executives to make compromises that flout the values they espouse.

An investigation by The New York Times revealed how Apple has risked its Chinese customers’ data and aided the Chinese government’s censorship. Here are five takeaways:


* Apple stores customer data on Chinese government servers.
* Apple now shares customer data with the Chinese government.
* Apple proactively removes apps to placate Chinese officials.
* Apple banned apps from a Communist Party critic.
* Tens of thousands of iPhone apps have disappeared in China.




Apple should run a TV ad promoting this as a selling point. "The iPhone is so secure that the Chinese government doesn't allow their employees to bring one to work. Security. That's iPhone."
iPhone may be secure. But customer data is not.
Score: 16 Votes (Like | Disagree)