Yahoo! withdrew from China, becoming the second largest US technology company after a month out of the country - Insurance Finances

Yahoo! suspended its services in mainland China on Monday, according to Fort Reuters . The company cited an "increasingly challenging legal and business environment" and was the second-largest US platform to close its China operations in the last month.

America's technological presence has disappeared in China. In October, Microsoft announced that it would shutting down LinkedIn's version in China, similarly cites “a significantly more challenging operating environment”. The Chinese government has also made many other platforms, including Facebook, Google, Instagram, Twitch, Twitter, Pinterest, Reddit, and YouTube, unavailable to domestic users. Bing seems to be the only major platform for search marketers still accessible to Chinese users .

Why operating in China may not be feasible for American companies. Under Chinese law, companies must submit their data to local authorities if required. Data can be used to identify and arrest dissidents, as in 2007 when Yahoo! passed sensitive e-mails to the Chinese authorities . As a result, companies operating in China may face pressure from local authorities there but may also return to the US for helping the Chinese government suppress freedom of expression.

Although not specifically cited in the Yahoo! statement. . The law limits what data companies can collect and establishes requirements for how it must be stored. In Microsoft's announcement that it would close the localized version of LinkedIn, the company cited "higher compliance requirements" as the cause for its departure.

Why do we care. China has 854 million internet users, the largest number of users in the world and twice the number of users in the United States (313 million). As the platforms that marketers can use to reach Chinese audiences are likely to withdraw from the country, so are the opportunities to reach that user base. However, the opposite is not necessarily true, as TikTok, owned by Chinese company ByteDance, is one of the most popular social media platforms in the US at the moment.

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