• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, November 2, 2021

Yahoo on Tuesday said it has pulled its services in China, citing a challenging business and legal environment.

“In recognition of the increasingly challenging business and legal environment in China, Yahoo’s suite of services will no longer be accessible from mainland China as of November 1,” the statement read.

The company remains committed to the rights of users and a free and open internet, but the withdrawal coincides with the implementation of China's Personal Information Protection Law, according to reports. The law limits what information companies can gather and sets standards for how it must be stored.

Yahoo closed its Beijing office in 2015, and shut its email service in the country, making its withdrawal from the country largely symbolic.

China’s government blocked its web portal in September 2000, restricting the link to overseas news websites or distributing news from overseas media without approval.  

The brand continued its global research and development center in Beijing until 2015, and then shut it down.

The move follows Microsoft’s decision to pull most of LinkedIn services that turned it from a business-to-business (B2B) social media platform into a job message board.

China’s restrictions on its residents reaches wide. Regulations announced in August by the National Press and Publication Administration in China banned minors from playing video games between Monday and Thursday.

The ban gave minors living in China one hour per day on Fridays, weekends and public holidays to play video games, and will only be permitted to play between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. The reason, to prevent minors from becoming addicted to video games, according to the National Press and Publication Administration in China.

The rules also urge the implementation of real-name registration and logins, saying that online game providers must not provide any form of game service to users who fail to register and log in using their real identifications.