NEW ZEALAND: Citing a directive from the Indian government, Alphabet Inc.’s Google on Thursday blocked access to a well-known battle-royale format game created by a South Korean company, Krafton.
After falling more than 9% on Friday due to the news, Krafton shares quickly recovered and fell only 5.7 percent.
The American tech giant claimed in a statement that it was compelled to remove the app from its Play Store because India had ordered the blocking of the Battlegrounds Mobile India (BGMI) game.
According to the game’s website, India is home to more than 100 million of its users. The restriction follows India’s 2020 ban on PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, another Krafton game (PUBG).
“We have notified the impacted developer and have blocked access to the app upon receipt of the order, in accordance with established procedure,” a Google spokesperson said.
Also unavailable on Thursday night in India was BGMI on Apple Inc.’s App Store.
It was not immediately obvious why the block was in place.
A Krafton spokesperson in Seoul stated that the developer was in contact with the appropriate agencies and businesses to determine the precise circumstances surrounding the suspension in the two major app stores in India.
Requests for comment made outside of regular business hours were not immediately answered by regional Apple representatives or the Indian IT ministry.
According to a source with firsthand knowledge of the situation, Google received the government takedown order just the previous day.
When India banned PUBG, it cited security concerns, but the move was largely viewed as a result of the country’s deteriorating business relations with China. Tencent from China had the exclusive publishing rights to PUBG in India at the time.
Following a months-long border standoff between the nuclear-armed rivals, New Delhi banned more than 100 mobile apps with Chinese origins. The crackdown was a part of that ban.
Since then, the ban has been extended to more than 300 apps.
