A Google spokesperson said on receipt of a government orderit notified the affected developer and blocked access to the app.
A Krafton spokesperson said: “We are clarifying how BGMI was removed from the Google Play store and the App store and will let you know once we get specific information.”
The South Korean gaming major launched BGMI in India in 2021, after the government banned PUBG amid its action against Chinese apps in September 2020. PUBG Mobile was published by China’s Tencent in India.
BGMI, very similar to PUBG in terms of look and gameplay, was available to users only in India. Within a year of its launch, BGMI’s user base had crossed more than 100 million on iPhone and Android.
It isn’t yet clear why the game has been banned in India. While some sources point towards “data irregularities”, the takedown order could also be because of recent incidents which have created a life security threat due to the game.
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In September 2020, India banned PUBG Mobile along with other Chinese apps amid a prolonged border standoff between the two Asian neighbours.
Following the ban, PUBG Corp, a subsidiary of Krafton, severed ties with Tencent in the Indian market and said it would respect the measures taken by the government as the privacy and security of player data were its top priorities. Later that year, Krafton announced it would launch the game directly in India and set up a local subsidiary. Soon after the launch of BGMI in June 2021, it was found that Krafton was sending some data to its servers in China, but which wasn’t in violation of its privacy policy.
“The game uses third-party solutions to provide unique game features, similar to other battleground games. In the process of using these solutions, some game data was shared to third parties,” it had said then.
In June 2021, following allegations of the company sending data to servers located in China, Krafton had reportedly told its users that it was working with the Indian government and remained fully compliant with local laws.
In June, the South Korean game creator’s chief executive, Changhan Kim, had told ET that the company planned to invest $100 million or more this year and the next in Indian startups.
“While BGMI is performing well in India, we are also focused on the IP, media, and entertainment sector as a whole for holistic growth. We expect that overall investments in the rest of 2022 and next year will be equal to or larger than $100 million,” Kim had said.
