Invite-only audio chatting app Clubhouse gets banned in China

Clubhouse, a live audio-only social media app that is quickly gaining traction around the world, is now banned in China. As per a TechCrunch report, this issue came into light when several users from China were not able to access the platform on Monday morning. The website, however, stays accessible. It is being speculated that the app might not make a return as it would have to go through several changes in order to comply with Chinese internet regulation.

It’s worth adding that Clubhouse has been facing criticism in the US for its lack of moderation. The report adds that although the app itself was not accessible via Apple’s China App Store, its audio rooms were, even without the use of VPN. 

Also read: Clubhouse app offers Chinese rare glimpse of censor-free debate

However, since the app was not officially present in the Apple App Store in the country, there is no metric on how many were actually using it. But it has been reported that rooms discussing the 1989 pro-democracy Tiananmen protest, a taboo topic in China, reached its limit of 5,000 users prior to the ban.

According to a report from Bloomberg, Chinese-speaking communities from around the world gathered to discuss China-Taiwan relations and the prospects of unification, and to share their knowledge and experience of Beijing’s crackdown on Muslim Uighurs in the far west region of Xinjiang. It is worth added that open discussion of such topics is off limits in China, where heavy government censorship is the norm. Unfavorable comments or articles are rapidly removed on platforms such as Tencent Holdings Ltd.’s WeChat and Sina Corp.’s microblogging platform Weibo.