China has ordered one of the country’s fastest-growing Internet startups, Beijing Bytedance Technology Co, to shut a popular joke-sharing app and delete its WeChat social media account, part of a resurgent effort to clean up online content.
The order to close “Neihan Duanzi” – a service through which users share often ribald jokes, videos and comedic skits – is the second time in as many days that regulators have gone after Bytedance’s products in a crackdown on undesirable content. Bytedance, known as Jinri Toutiao, is one of the world’s largest media startups with a valuation of over US$20bil (RM77.41bil), thanks to its main news and video aggregation app.