Encrypted messaging app Signal appears to have been blocked in mainland China, the latest foreign social media service to cease working in a country where the government tightly controls the flow of information.
(AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)HONG KONG – Encrypted messaging app Signal appears to have been blocked in mainland China, the latest foreign social media service to cease working in a country where the government tightly controls the flow of information.
The move to silence Signal, one of the few remaining messaging apps in China that allowed users to engage in encrypted messaging, comes as China expands controls to shape public opinion and at times limit private discourse.
In China, services like Facebook, Google and Twitter have been blocked for years.
The app recently had grown popular among users in China concerned about privacy issues, although the numbers of Signal users in the country is still small compared to the ubiquitous WeChat messaging app.