The Wall Street Journal reported that Chinese government agencies have banned employees from using Apple iPhones and other foreign-branded devices at work, citing sources related to the matter.
The newspaper added that employees at "some" central government regulatory agencies have been instructed via chat groups and in meetings to stop bringing these tools into the office.
The newspaper said it was not clear the scope of generalization of such orders.
Apple phones are widely popular in China, its largest international market, despite growing dissatisfaction with American efforts to contain the technology industry in the Asian country.
iPhones produced by Apple are among the best-selling devices in the country and are popular in the government and private sectors.
Paris : “Meta” removes the “News” label from its users’ accounts in Britain, France, and Germany
The American social media giant Meta Group announced on Tuesday that it will stop providing the “Facebook News” tab at the end of the current year in its main European markets, namely the United Kingdom, France, and Germany.
The group confirmed in an article on its blog that reading and sharing news will remain available to users through the developments bar, but it made clear that from today onwards it will not take on the “News” tab and will not enter into agreements with news publishers to provide content in these countries that have a larger number of users. There are more than 130 million social networks in the world, according to the article.
Several disputes arose in various parts of the world between Meta, legislators and media institutions, as these parties accused the giant Silicon Valley company and other major digital companies of making profits thanks to their news content without giving them a fair share of advertising revenues in return.
Brussels : The European Union imposes additional restrictions on 6 tech giants
On Wednesday, the European Union imposed additional rules on 6 technology giants, including Meta , Apple and Microsoft, to prevent them from abusing their dominant position in the digital market.
The union’s executive body announced in a statement that it had classified Alphabet, Amazon, ByteDance, Meta, and Microsoft as “gatekeepers” under the European bloc’s new digital services law.
She explained that the EU can designate technology companies as "gatekeepers" if they "provide a significant gateway between businesses and consumers in respect of the platform's key services".
In other words, the gatekeepers are the digital giants, such as search engines, social networks, and cloud services, which are impossible to avoid when using the Internet.
Following the Union’s regulation that entered into force last August, the new decision imposes additional obligations on technology companies to prevent them from applying “unfair conditions to companies and end users and to ensure the openness of important digital services.”
Under the decision, “companies now have 6 months to implement the list of obligations and restrictions” set by the European Union Commission.
If companies fail to comply with the new rules, “the European Union could impose a penalty of up to 10 percent of their annual revenue, which could be doubled if they repeat the violation.”
At the same time, the EU Commission is now examining the appeal of Microsoft and Apple, which have claimed that some of their services such as Bing, Edge and Microsoft Advertising, as well as iMessage, do not qualify as “gatekeepers”.
Apple's popularity in China persists despite geopolitical friction.
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