U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday banning transactions with eight Chinese apps, including WeChat Pay and AliPay (via Reuters)
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The order prohibits all US transactions with the companies behind the apps, the full list of which includes Alipay, CamScanner, QQ Wallet, SHAREit, Tencent QQ, VMate, WeChat Pay and WPS Office.
The request gives the Department of Commerce the definition of which transactions will be prohibited under the guideline within 45 days, but a U.S. official said Reuters that the Commerce Department plans to act before January 20, when Trump leaves office.
“By accessing personal electronic devices, such as smartphones, tablets and computers, Chinese connected software applications can access and capture a wide range of user information, including confidential personally identifiable information and private information,” says the executive order.
This data collection “would allow China to track the location of federal and contract employees and build personal information files,” the document adds.
The applications mentioned are extremely popular with users of Chinese mobile devices and, if the order is successful, the bans would be a significant blow to Chinese Americans who use applications like WeChat to communicate.
The new orders are in addition to two previous ones signed by Trump in August, which attempted to ban transactions with WeChat and TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance. The first order was blocked by a judge in September and again in October, while an injunction granted by another judge in December prevented TikTok’s ban from proceeding.
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