Krafton clears air on Battleground Mobile routing user data to Chinese server

Last week, Battleground Mobile India (BGMI) was made available for early access to select people before the official launch in the country.

However, within days after the soft launch, IGN reported that the gaming app was routing user data to servers in multiple countries including Microsoft's Azure data center in the US, Moscow, India (Mumbai), Tencent-owned Proxima Beta in Hong Kong, and also one run by China Mobile Communications in Beijing, China.

This led huge uproar on social media platforms in India and even Member of Parliament Meenakshi Lekhi called on the Union Ministry of Electronics and Information & Technology to look into the reports.

Meanwhile, BGMI's parent company Krafton Corp has acknowledged the issue and but clarified that no personally identifiable user details have been shared with any third-party companies.

The particular data being exchanged between the phone and server are only to enable certain game features.

"Battleground Mobile India uses third-party solutions to provide unique game features. In the process of using these solutions, some game data was shared with third parties. BATTLEGROUNDS MOBILE INDIA’s privacy policy fully discloses that the app may transfer some user data, with users’ consent to the privacy policy and choosing to migrate their accounts. No data has been shared in violation of the privacy policy," Krafton said to DH.

Also, the company has released a new software update to the BGMI and the gaming app is no longer communicating with the server located in China.

It should be noted that Krafton's PUBG Mobile, which was then licensed by Tencent Games in India, was banned by the government over user privacy concerns.

Must read | Govt bans PUBG Mobile, Baidu, Alipay, Tencent games and 114 more Chinese apps [full list]

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