India, which starting banning several apps starting 2020 — particularly Chinese — for national security reasons, is adding more to the list. These bans are now impacting virtual private network service providers, as Apple App Store and Google Play Store have reportedly removed more than 6 VPN apps from the country following a government order. This list of affected VPN apps includes the immensely popular Cloudflare 1.1.1.1 app, as reported by TechCrunch. Launched in 2010, Cloudflare prominently expanded its services in major Indian cities in 2019.
This is the first major enforcement of India’s 2022 laws concerning VPN apps. In 2022, the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) of India set new regulations mandating that VPN and cloud service providers with physical servers in the country must maintain and store user data. As per the rules, VPN and cloud service operators must keep comprehensive records of their customers, including names, addresses, IP addresses, and transaction histories, for a period of five years.
These strict rules faced opposition from major companies in the VPN industry, with NordVPN, ExpressVPN, and Surfshark expressing strong concerns. Additionally, some of them planned to remove their servers from the country.
However, the Indian government has increasingly regulated internet use, introducing various measures in the past few years. Earlier, with the VPN framework, the government brought in the Information Technology Act. In 2020, it banned TikTok along with 58 other China-based apps, which resulted in a global fall out for TikTok, including a rather protracted battle in the US. Additionally, the country’s IT Rules further expanded the government’s ability to regulate online content in 2021. Even in 2022, the ban list grew broader as 54 more Chinese apps faced a ban, including the popular battle royale gaming app Garena’s Free Fire: Illuminate.
Reports suggest that the Indian Ministry of Home Affairs has issued removal orders for these VPN apps, citing the related document. Play Store owner – Google – reportedly also notified Lumen, Harvard University’s database that tracks global government takedown requests, about the action. The list of affected apps also includes names like Hide.me and PrivadoVPN.
The action against VPN service providers becomes more significant as India’s VPN market is among the world’s largest and is expected to grow significantly in the coming years. As per estimations, in 2023, India’s VPN market generated $4.166 billion in revenue and is expected to reach $7.681 billion by 2030, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.1% from 2024 to 2030. With 270 million VPN users in 2021, there are limited VPN service providers in India. The list includes Surfshark, NordVPN, ExpressVPN, PureVPN, IPVanish and a few others.
