Is NYTimes: Breaking World News censored by Apple?

Why it is unavailable

1. Apple said publicly · 2016-12-23

   Apple said the app had "been informed that the app is in violation of local regulations" and so "must be taken down off the China App Store", adding that it would be offered again "when this situation changes". It declined to say which regulations. The app has not returned; our monitoring began in 2019 and has never recorded it available in China.

   Source:The New York Times: Apple Removes New York Times Apps From Its Store in ChinaApplies to mainland China.

Five things can put an app out of one App Store. Each is weighed below against what can be seen from outside — open a card for the reasoning.

• A government or a court demanded itOn the record

  and Apple complied. Apple publishes a count of these per country each year and never says which apps they were. Apple's 2025 App Store Transparency Report

  • News apps in mainland China are unavailable at 20%, near the 28% for everything there, which cuts neither way.
  • Apple reports 196 government-ordered removals in mainland China for 2025, naming none of them.
  • A cited source says so — above.
• Apple applied a rule, unaskedPossible

  either its own review guidelines, or its own reading of a local law, with nobody having demanded anything. This is the largest category in Apple's own removal figures by a wide margin, and it covers distribution permits as well as content — Apple kept a free Bible app out of mainland China in 2021 for want of one. Apple's 2025 App Store Transparency Report

  • News apps in mainland China are unavailable at 20%, near the 28% for everything there, which cuts neither way.
  • A different cause is cited above.
• The developer withheld itPossible

  freely, or under legal advice of their own, or because Apple's guidelines require that kind of app to be limited to certain countries. Switching a country off is easy for a developer to do in Apple's own tools: it needs no new version of the app, and it leaves no public trace other than the app being unavailable.

  • A different cause is cited above.
• Something brokeUnlikely

  a rejected update, a lapsed certificate, a payment or licensing problem, a mistake nobody has got round to noticing.

  • Gone for 7 years.
  • A different cause is cited above.
• A local rule about paying for itRuled out

  gambling licences, financial rules, tax — the kind of law that governs a transaction. Apple can obey every one of them by refusing the payment, which is why this is the only restriction we would accept and the only one that cannot touch a free app.

  • It is free, so Apple sells nothing here.

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