India Tightens VPN Regulations: Major Apps Removed Amid National Security Concerns

India started banning apps in 2020 because they were thought to be dangerous to national security. Now they are going after virtual private network (VPN) service providers. TechCrunch reports that Apple App Store and Google Play Store have taken down more than six VPN apps because of a government order. This includes the widely used Cloudflare 1.1.1.1. This is the first big implementation of India's new VPN rules, which were put in place by the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) in 2022.

The rules say that VPN companies with servers in India have to keep customer data like names, IP addresses, and transaction histories for five years. Concerns have been made by big players like NordVPN, ExpressVPN, and Surfshark, and some have decided to pull their servers from the country.

India's rules and regulations are not new. The Information Technology Act said that TikTok and 58 other Chinese apps could not be used after 2020. On this list by 2022, 54 more apps were added, like the well-known game Free Fire: Illuminate. The IT Rules of 2021 gave the government even more power over what people see online.

It's interesting that this crackdown is happening at a time when India's VPN market has a lot of room to grow. With a 9.1% CAGR, it is expected to bring in $7.681 billion by 2030, up from $4.166 billion in 2023. Even though there were 270 million VPN users in 2021, the industry is now under a lot more scrutiny, and big companies like Google have told Harvard's Lumen database about the takedowns.

Source : The Tech Portal