Bitchat Pulled From Indian App Stores After Government Order, Dorsey Says
Jack Dorsey says India ordered Apple to remove Bitchat, his offline mesh messaging app, from its App Store, and the app is also gone from Google Play there. Apple cited Section 69A of India's IT Act; a digital rights group calls the order unconstitutional.
Dorsey posted on X a copy of a notice he said came from Apple, in which India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology demanded the removal under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, the country's main legal provision for government-ordered online blocking. According to the notice, Bitchat remains available on Apple's App Store outside India, but access through Apple's TestFlight beta-testing service is also blocked inside the country.
When TechCrunch checked on Saturday, Bitchat was no longer downloadable through Google Play in India, and the app's website was unreachable across several internet service providers in the country. It was not immediately clear whether Google and the service providers had received their own directions from the federal government. Apple, Google and India's IT ministry did not respond to requests for comment.
Bitchat launched in July last year and uses Bluetooth mesh networking so that nearby devices can exchange encrypted messages without cellular networks, internet access or centralized servers, the feature that has drawn both users and official scrutiny.
In July 2026, Dorsey disclosed that Indian authorities had ordered GitHub to take down repositories linked to the open-source app, a move that prompted digital rights advocates and legal experts to question the legal basis for restricting software over its functionality. In that order, the government said Bitchat's architecture made it difficult for law enforcement agencies to intercept communications or trace users, and cited its ability to keep working during internet shutdowns. The July order rested on a provision of India's information technology law covering intermediaries and their liability for third-party content, a different basis from the Section 69A cited in Apple's notice.
The Internet Freedom Foundation, a digital rights advocacy group based in New Delhi, called the latest order unconstitutional. The group argued that Section 69A permits the government to block unlawful information but not a messaging app because of its capacity to operate during internet shutdowns, and said neither the blocking order nor the allegedly illegal content cited to justify it has been made public.
The restriction comes amid a new wave of youth-led protests in India over changes to the country's voter rolls. Police detained several people during demonstrations in New Delhi on Saturday, where protesters demanded the resignation of India's chief election commissioner over alleged manipulation of electoral rolls. Authorities suspended internet services around New Delhi's Jantar Mantar for 12 hours on Friday during protests there.
During the July protests, demonstrators reportedly turned to Bitchat and the rival app Briar after authorities suspended internet services. Interest in Bitchat surged in India at the same time: data from the market intelligence firm Sensor Tower showed the country accounted for about 85% of the app's global downloads between July 17 and July 23, up from roughly 1% in the preceding 30 days.