Apple Pulls Jack Dorsey’s Bitchat From China App Store
Bitchat is an open-source messaging app launched in July 2025 by Jack Dorsey, the Block CEO and Twitter co-founder. It uses Bluetooth-based peer-to-peer mesh networking to transmit encrypted messages without internet access, central servers, user accounts or phone numbers. Its ability to operate during internet shutdowns and platform blocks has driven adoption during protests in countries including Iran, while making the service difficult to control through conventional censorship tools.
Apple removed Bitchat from its China App Store on Feb. 28, 2026, at the request of the Cyberspace Administration of China, and also disabled access to its TestFlight beta in the country. Dorsey disclosed the action on X on April 5 by posting a screenshot of Apple’s notice. The CAC cited Article 3 of security-assessment rules covering online services with “public opinion” or “social mobilization” capabilities. Bitchat remains available through Apple’s storefronts in other markets.
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The history behind this eventIndia Orders GitHub to Remove Jack Dorsey’s Bitcoin-Linked Bitchat
Bitchat, an open-source messaging app launched by Block CEO and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey in 2025, uses Bluetooth Low Energy mesh networks to relay encrypted messages without mobile service, Wi-Fi, accounts or central servers. It can route messages across as many as seven nearby devices and use the decentralized Nostr protocol when internet access returns. The Bitcoin-linked project has become a test of how governments regulate communications tools designed to keep working during network shutdowns.
India’s Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), part of the Ministry of Home Affairs, ordered GitHub on July 23 to disable three Bitchat repositories within three hours, citing the Information Technology Act, 2000, and 2021 intermediary rules. The directive came as mobile internet was suspended within 1.5 kilometers of Delhi’s Jantar Mantar protest site from 4 p.m. to midnight, the sixth shutdown in a week. Dorsey published the notice on July 24. The Internet Freedom Foundation called it unconstitutional; the repositories remained accessible as of that day.
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