Apple is restricting the iPhone's AirDrop function - and may be supporting China's communist regime in doing so. This is because the function is used particularly frequently by protesters against the Communist People's Party to organize anti-government protests.

"Down with Xi Jinping!" Major protests against the regime are currently flaring up in China's major cities. With the help of technical devices. Many protesters used the AirDrop function on their iPhones. For example, to organize their demonstrations and send protest pictures - and thus circumvent the Chinese government's censorship. But this could now be a thing of the past. After an iPhone update, AirDrop can only be used to a limited extent in China.

A bow to the government

The fact that the US tech giant Apple is dependent on the Chinese market is nothing new. The company generates around 15 percent of its turnover in China. But Apple has probably never been so obviously cowering before the Chinese regime as it is now. With the latest iPhone update (16.1.1), the company introduced a change that is intended to curb the current protests in China's major cities. While AirDrop reception was previously always possible, it now has to be reactivated every ten minutes. Explosive: the restriction was only implemented on devices sold in China.

Why AirDrop in particular?

AirDrop allows users to exchange digital content between two or more Apple devices. And this virtually bypasses the internet, as AirDrop uses its own network for data transfer. In this way, Chinese protesters have so far been able to circumvent the regime's internet censorship - which incidentally also includes Instagram and YouTube. Furthermore, it was almost impossible to trace the originator of the shared data.

Apple has already helped the Chinese government once

Possibly out of fear of an impending loss of control, China has now exerted pressure on Apple - and prompted the US company to impose restrictions on AirDrop. This is not the first time that Apple has acted in the interests of the Chinese regime. Back in 2019 - at the height of the Hong Kong protests - the company deleted various apps from its App Store that were used by protesters for internal and external communication. However, it is still unclear why the change was introduced to AirDrop. It is also questionable whether it will be implemented in other countries in the future. Apple has so far left all press inquiries in this regard unanswered.