India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

India’s telecoms ministry has privately requested smartphone makers to preload all new gadgets with a state-owned cyber safety app that can’t be deleted, a authorities order confirmed, a transfer doubtless to antagonise Apple and privateness advocates.

India is among the world’s largest phone markets, with greater than 1.2 billion subscribers, and authorities figures present the app, launched in January, has helped get better greater than 700,000 misplaced telephones, together with 50,000 in October alone.

Apple, which has beforehand locked horns with the telecoms regulator over growth of a authorities anti-spam cellular app, is among the many corporations, reminiscent of Samsung, Vivo, Oppo and Xiaomi certain by the brand new order.

The November 28 order, seen by Reuters, provides main smartphone corporations 90 days to be certain that the federal government’s Sanchar Saathi app is pre-installed on new cellphones, with a provision that customers can’t disable it.

For gadgets already within the provide chain, producers ought to push the app to telephones through software program updates, the ministry stated in its order, which was not made public and was despatched privately to choose corporations.

The authorities stated the app was important to fight “serious endangerment” of telecom cyber safety from duplicate or spoofed IMEI numbers, which allow scams and community misuse.

Apple’s iOS powered an estimated 4.5% of 735 million smartphones in India by mid-2025, with the remainder utilizing Android, Counterpoint Research says.

TELECOM CYBER SECURITY

While Apple pre-installs its personal proprietary apps on telephones, its inside insurance policies prohibit set up of any authorities or third-party app earlier than sale of a smartphone, a supply with direct data of the matter stated.

“Apple has historically refused such requests from governments,” stated Tarun Pathak, a analysis director at Counterpoint.

“It’s likely to seek a middle ground: instead of a mandatory pre-install, they might negotiate and ask for an option to nudge users towards installing the app.”

Apple, Google, Samsung and Xiaomi didn’t reply to requests for remark. India’s telecoms ministry additionally didn’t reply.

A 14- to 17-digit quantity distinctive to every handset, the IMEI, or International Mobile Equipment Identity, is mostly used to reduce off community entry for telephones reported to have been stolen.

The authorities app permits customers to report suspicious calls, confirm IMEIs and block stolen gadgets via a central registry.

With greater than 5 million downloads since its launch, the app has helped block greater than 3.7 million stolen or misplaced cellphones, whereas greater than 30 million fraudulent connections have additionally been terminated.

The authorities says it helps forestall cyber threats and assists monitoring and blocking of misplaced or stolen telephones, serving to police to hint gadgets, whereas preserving counterfeits out of the black market.