The Indian Army has asked its personnel to delete 89 apps from their smartphones including Facebook, TikTok, Truecaller and Instagram to plug leakage of information

The Indian Army has asked its personnel to delete 89 apps from their smartphones including Facebook, TikTok, Truecaller and Instagram to plug leakage of information, news agency ANI reported today quoting Indian Army Sources. The Indian Army personnel have also been asked to delete dating apps such as Tinder, Couch Surfing along with news apps like Daily Hunt in the instructions issued recently.

The news of restriction on use of these apps by Indian Army personnel comes days after Government of India banned 59 Chinese apps including TikTok, UC News and CamScanner.

The list of apps the Indian army personnel has reportedly been asked to delete from their smartphones is divided into numerous categories like messaging platforms (Kik, Viber, Hike and others), video hosting (TikTok, Likee and others), content sharing (Shareit, Xender and others), web browsers (UC Browser and UC Browser Mini), video and live streaming (BigoLive, Zoom and others), utility apps (CamScanner, Truecaller and others), gaming apps (PUBG, Mobile Legends and others), e-commerce (AliExpress and others), dating apps (Tinder and others), antivirus (360 Security), news apps (Daily Hunt and others), lifestyle apps (POPXO), music apps (Hungama and others), and blogging (Reddit and others).

Facebook is without a doubt one of the biggest names in the list. So are apps like Instagram and Zoom.

The main concern in the case of the government’s move to ban 59 Chinese apps was the collection of user data and the unauthorised sending of this data to locations outside of India. The Indian army ban also seems more or less guided by the same concern.