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ARTICLE 19 China Apple purged non-compliant apps following an apparent crackdown by Chinese authorities.81 As of 2023, China requires all apps to obtain this licence (among other requirements). Apple staff had a series of discussions with Chinese officials to express concerns about the rule but, as of October 2023, Apple began to implement it.82 This is a significant development because users have long used the Apple’s App Store to gain access to apps which are otherwise blocked in China, such as Instagram, YouTube, and WhatsApp; users have been able to download them and then use a VPN to access them.83 Beyond enforcing these general licensing requirements, Apple has also long faced criticism for removing apps deemed to be politically sensitive in China, often in a non-transparent way. For example, a 2021 New York Times analysis noted that Apple’s own figures indicated that they had removed 1,217 apps in 2018–2020, approving 91% of the government’s requests, while removing only 253 apps in all other countries combined (representing 40% of removal requests). 84 The Times estimated that this number was low, since 55,000 apps had disappeared from the store since 2017. Apple contested these figures, arguing that many developers had removed the apps of their own accord. However, the Times attributed at least some of the difference to Apple internally censoring apps even absent a takedown request. A former head of Apple’s App Store who said that Apple’s lawyers in China gave his team a list of forbidden topics, such as ‘Tiananmen Square’, and that associated apps were then removed proactively. A Tech Transparency Project report reached similar conclusions, identifying 3,200 missing apps in a six-month period compared with only hundreds which were reported by Apple. Although, again, these missing apps could have been voluntarily removed by developers, the Tech Transparency Project concluded there was likely additional censorship by Apple of apps with sensitive content such as human rights, religion, politics, and LGBTQI+ issues, ____________________________________________ 81 J. Porter, Apple Closes Chinese App Store Loophole, Causing Thousands of Games to be Removed, The Verge, 22 June 2020; Al-Jazeera, Game Over: Apple Removes Thousands of Titles from China App Store, 15 July 2020. 82 Y. Kubota, Y. Jie, and A. Tilley, Apple’s Latest China Challenge: A Crackdown That Could Shrink Its App Store, Wall Street Journal, 29 September 2023; Apple Developer, Reference: App Information; W. Davis, Apple Is Locking Down the iPhone App Store to Comply with a New Law in China, The Verge, 3 October 2023. 83 Kubota, Jie, and Tilley, Apple’s Latest China Challenge. 84 Nicas, Zhong, and Wakabayashi, Censorship, Surveillance and Profits. 26

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Engaging tech for internet freedom in authoritarian countries

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Information Operation
Internet Restrictions

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Article 19

Date Published: Oct 5, 2024

Abstract: In this report, ARTICLE 19 reviews the human rights context and responsibilities of tech companies operating in 3 authoritarian countries in Asia, namely China, Myanmar, and Vietnam. It focuses on the rights to freedom of expression and privacy, and the manner in which authoritarian states directly or indirectly expect companies to assist them in censoring content, promoting propaganda, accessing user data, and engaging in surveillance. While these are undoubtedly highly challenging contexts, companies have not sufficiently prioritised protecting human rights in their policies and actions. States are the primary duty bearers under international human rights law, but companies also have human rights responsibilities, as outlined in the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs). Even if domestic law or circumstances make it impossible for companies to fully meet their human rights responsibilities, they should take action so as to respect human rights standards to the greatest extent possible. Tech companies should not merely reference local law as an excuse for collaborating in rights violations. They should take steps such as those detailed in this report, like adopting appropriate policies, asking governments to justify content removal requests clearly and specifically, and reporting transparently on their compliance with government demands. For each country, we survey the country context and provide an overview of legal obligations which companies operate under that are problematic from the perspective of international human rights law and that may, as a result, put pressure on companies to become complicit in violations of the rights to freedom of expression and privacy. We then explore how Western tech companies operating in these countries, many of which have explicitly stated their commitment to respecting freedom of expression and privacy, have responded to these legal obligations and to other government expectations that they will cooperate in violations of these rights.

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Engaging tech for internet freedom in authoritarian countries

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