Trump hit the Chinese Tencent. The blow will reach the creators of League of Legends, Fortnite, WoW and other games

As announced yesterday , the US administration has started a war with Chinese digital service providers. Tencent and ByteDance have 45 days to settle their errands in America.

Mike Pompeo’s plan, presented yesterday, seems to be being implemented. President Donald Trump has just signed an ordinance prohibiting the cooperation of US economic and official entities with the owners of TikTok and WeChat services. The regulation, unless blocked by a US court, will come into force in 45 days.

INBOX: @realDonaldTrump has signed an executive order to ban TikTok in 45 days. pic.twitter.com/1zR4HgCPVj

– Andrew Feinberg (@AndrewFeinberg) August 7, 2020

In the justification, Trump writes that the applications of these companies – in his opinion – expose national security, foreign policy and the economy of the United States to sabotage by the Chinese authorities. Information collected by WeChat and TikTok may, it claims, process location and browsing history data for US citizens.

This information, according to the president’s diagnosis, could be used to track and profile US federal agents, as well as to spy on and blackmail them. Trump also adds that TikTok has already been exiled from India for similar reasons.

The problem is that Tencent – the owner of WeChat – is also a co-owner of many companies associated with the United States.

WeChat is an extremely popular service and social platform in China, which enjoys little popularity in Europe and America and is available in a very limited form. Although it is undoubtedly an absolute power on the domestic market. Donald Trump, however, does not seem to be aware of what else Tencent is doing. Or it is – and it is deeply respected.

Tencent is a strategic shareholder of companies such as Riot Games (creators of the extremely popular League of Legends esports game), Epic Games (creators of Unreal Engine , Fortnite games, owners of Epic Games Store ) or Activision Blizzard (creators of, among others, World of Warcraft , Call of Duty , Overwatch and Battle.net networks), Tesla (a fashionable electric car manufacturer) and Snap (owner of the Snapchat service).

This could potentially mean that American game developers will not be able to use the extremely popular and useful Unreal Engine technology or appear through the Epic Games Store. The record-breaking game of Fortnite may disappear from iPhones and iPads as it will no longer be offered by the App Store.

This is potentially a disaster for the US electronic entertainment industry – and more.

At Spider’s Web, we focus mainly on technology – however, it is worth remembering that Tencent is also a media giant. Tencent pays the American NBA $ 300 million for the retransmission rights alone. annually. Similar rights are bought in the NFL, NHL and MLB leagues.

If you are interested in a thorough analysis of Tencent’s reach on the international market, I would like to encourage you to read the fantastic material by Szymon Radzewicz . We have to wait for the reaction of American companies and courts – there is still a high probability that the regulation will be buried by lawyers. What now almost the entire American video game industry – and a significant part of the entertainment – is very much counting on.

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Trump hit the Chinese Tencent. The blow will reach the creators of League of Legends, Fortnite, WoW and other games

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