Recently, there has been a stir in the Chinese community in Canada and North America! That is, Canada is considering banning WeChat, which has been gradually implemented in Canadian universities and is tightening the policy step by step.
It all started in October 2023, when the Canadian government suddenly announced that it would ban the installation of China's WeChat and the United States' Kaspersky software on government devices, and the reason given was still the so-called "national security" that we are all too familiar with. In November, McGill University issued an announcement on its official website, saying that it would ban the installation of WeChat on the school's devices.
Just now, Concordia University also issued an announcement that it is forbidden to install WeChat on devices that belong to the school and sponsored by the school, and further stated that the WeChat software will not be able to be used when connected to the school network. In other words, if you are a student and teacher at school, you can only use WeChat on your own device through the mobile network. However, the school later issued a statement saying that it "strongly advises" students not to access school-related data if they have WeChat installed on their mobile phones, so as to avoid data leakage.
In response to the intensifying ban on WeChat, the president of the Finance Council of Canada has explained that it is to "ensure the security of Canadian data and be consistent with the practices of international partners". In fact, the second half of the sentence is the key, and Canada's so-called "international partner" is actually referring to the United States.
In fact, Canada's ban on WeChat and TikTok has been closely following the steps of the United States. In August 2020, Trump suddenly banned WeChat and TikTok downloads in the United States, and was immediately boycotted by more than a dozen American companies such as Apple, Ford, and Walmart, because they were worried that on the one hand, it would affect the business of American companies in China, and on the other hand, they were more worried that they would be reciprocal countermeasures from China and be sanctioned by China.
In this regard, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the mainland was directly angry. Spokesman Zhao Lijian bluntly replied to Trump in front of Chinese and foreign reporters: If the U.S. government really wants to block WeChat, then we think the Apple mobile phone can also be used. In addition, the Chinese in the United States were also angry, and really blocking WeChat was equivalent to cutting off the communication channels between the Chinese and Chinese mainland, so the Chinese Americans jointly established the United States WeChat Users Association (USWUA) and sued the Trump administration and demanded huge compensation.
Finally, under pressure from many parties, it only lasted for 2 days, and Trump was forced to revoke the ban under pressure, and the ban on WeChat came to an end temporarily.
TikTok has suffered the same experience as WeChat, and from 2020 to the present, TikTok and its CEO Zhou Shouzi have been subjected to an unknown number of censorship and investigations in the United States. In a recent review on Jan. 31, 2024, Republican Senator Tom Cotton asked eight questions about Zhou's nationality. At a hearing in March last year, lawmakers from both parties asked Zhou Shouzi more than 200 questions in a forced tone, with the aim of finding out that Zhou Shouzi and TikTok have some kind of connection with Chinese mainland, so as to prove that TikTok has security problems.
Why has the United States been targeting WeChat and TikTok? Because the United States has been using its media hegemony to control the direction of global public opinion. However, the explosion of TikTok has directly caused the US media hegemony to fail, and directly tore apart the ugly face of the US public opinion hegemony. For example, in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, a large number of Israel's atrocities have been uploaded to TikTok by the Palestinian people and have aroused widespread attention from international public opinion, allowing people all over the world to see the truth clearly!
Chinese mainland The United States has banned WeChat, including the previously launched "China Action Plan", the real purpose of which is to cut off the communication channels of Chinese scientists in the United States to the mainland, prevent core secrets, academic achievements, etc. from flowing to the mainland, in an attempt to make Chinese mainland and other countries around the world "decouple and break the chain", so as to reduce China's influence in the world!
At present, the United States and Canada have become more and more strict in blocking WeChat and TikTok, just as Zhao Lijian said, if you dare to block WeChat, then we don't use Apple mobile phones! With the return of Huawei, Apple has suffered a major blow in the Chinese market. According to the latest data, Apple's revenue in Greater China in the first fiscal quarter of 2024 is only $20.8 billion, a year-on-year plunge of 13%!
And at present, Huawei has just solved the problem of Kirin chip production capacity, and the mobile phone market has not yet fully returned, and so on in the second half of this year, with the launch of Huawei's sub-brand, the debut of the 5nm new Kirin chip and the arrival of the Mate70 series, Apple's sales in China will plummet by at least 3%. In a few years, Apple may gradually fade out of the Chinese market like Samsung!