Apple said it complied with orders from the Chinese government to remove the Meta-owned WhatsApp and Threads from its App Store in China. Apple also removed Telegram and Signal from China.
The New York Times similarly wrote that “a person briefed on the situation said the Chinese government had found content on WhatsApp and Threads about China’s president, Xi Jinping, that was inflammatory and violated the country’s cybersecurity laws. The specifics of what was in the content was unclear, the person said.”
“These apps and many foreign apps are normally blocked on Chinese networks by the ‘Great Firewall’—the country’s extensive cybersystem of censorship—and can only be used with a virtual private network or other proxy tools,” Reuters wrote.
“For years, Apple has bowed to Beijing’s demands that it block an array of apps, including newspapers, VPNs, and encrypted messaging services,” The New York Times noted yesterday.
Oh, certainly I would advocate using Android anywhere, but especially China.
Unless you plan on installing more than a bit of Chinese apps, in which case the chaotic market of Chinese notification services (made due to the discontinuation of Google’s) will consume all your RAM.
The ideal solution would be Linux, as always, except it’s not even close to usable on mobile afaik. But I have some free time, an old Moto (with open bootloader) and the Arch wiki.