After Microsoft, which last month “unplugged” Linkedin in China, the Yahoo announced that it had stopped allowing access to its services from mainland China “recognizing the increasingly difficult business and legal environment”.
The company stopped providing content to users in mainland China from yesterday, November 1, according to an announcement posted on its website, which directs users of Yahoo and AOL emails to other links.
“In recognition of the increasingly difficult business and legal environment in China, its range of services Yahoo will no longer be accessible from mainland China “As of November 1,” a Yahoo spokesman told Reuters in an e-mail today. “Yahoo remains committed to the rights of our users and to a free and open Internet. We thank our users for their support “he concludes.
Yahoo’s move follows this one Microsoft, marking the setback of the latest major US-owned social media in China. The Linkedin cited a “functional environment with more challenges and greater compliance requirements in China”.
Yahoo had already severely curtailed its presence in China in recent years. Before yesterday, Monday, there was still an application for weather forecast and some pages that displayed news in foreign languages.
Yahoo, according to the Athenian-Macedonian News Agency, entered China in 1998 and in 2012 reached an agreement with the Alibaba group to sell its stake in the e-commerce giant. The agreement also stipulated that Alibaba would have the right to operate Yahoo China under the Yahoo brand name for up to four years.
Yahoo China then shut down its e-mail service and web portal, but retained its global R&D center in Beijing until 2015, when it closed.
Its departure comes as Beijing imposes new restrictions on Internet companies in areas ranging from content to customers’ personal data, while also passing new laws. Yesterday, Monday, the new law for the Protection of Personal Information entered into force, which aims to protect the personal data of users.
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