Accounts registered using Chinese phone numbers are managed under the Weixin brand, and their data is stored in mainland China and subject to Weixin's terms of service and privacy policy, which forbids content which "endanger[s] national security, divulge[s] state secrets, subvert[s] state power and undermine[s] national unity".[10] Non-Chinese numbers are registered under WeChat, and WeChat users are subject to a different, less strict terms of service and stricter privacy policy, and their data is stored in the Netherlands for users in the European Union, and in Singapore for other users.[11][12] User activity on Weixin, the Chinese version of the app, is analyzed, tracked and shared with Chinese authorities upon request as part of the mass surveillance network in China.[b] Chinese-registered Weixin accounts censor politically sensitive topics.[c][17][22] Any interactions between Weixin and WeChat users are subject to the terms of service and privacy policies of both services.[23]
In response to a border dispute between India and China, WeChat was banned in India in June 2020 along with several other Chinese apps, including TikTok.[24][25] U.S. president Donald Trump[26] sought to ban U.S. "transactions" with WeChat through an executive order but was blocked by a preliminary injunction issued in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California in September 2020. Joe Biden officially dropped Trump's efforts to ban WeChat in the U.S. in June 2021.[27]
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By 2010, Tencent had already attained a massive user base with their desktop messenger app QQ. Recognizing smart phones were likely to disrupt this status quo, CEO Pony Ma sought to proactively invest in alternatives to their own QQ messenger app.[28]
WeChat began as a project at Tencent Guangzhou Research and Project center in October 2010.[29] The original version of the app was created by Allen Zhang, named "Weixin" () by Pony Ma,[30] and launched in 2011. The term User adoption of WeChat was initially very slow, with users wondering why key features were missing; however, after the release of the Walkie-talkie-like voice messaging feature in May of that year, growth surged.[28] By 2012, when the number of users reached 100 million, Weixin was re-branded "WeChat" by President Martin Lau for the international market.[31]
WeChat had over 889 million monthly active users by 2016, and as of 2019 WeChat's monthly active users had risen to an estimate of one billion. As of January 2022, it was reported that WeChat has more than 1.2 billion users.[33] After the launch of WeChat payment in 2013, its users reached 400 million the next year,[34][35][36] 90 percent of whom were in China.[37] By comparison, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp had about one billion monthly active users in 2016 but did not offer most of the other services available on WeChat.[5][38] For example, in Q2 2017, WeChat's revenues from social media advertising were about US$0.9 billion (RMB6 billion) compared with Facebook's total revenues of US$9.3 billion, 98% of which were from social media advertising. WeChat's revenues from its value-added services were US$5.5 billion.[39]
In response to a border dispute between India and China, WeChat was banned in India in June 2020 along with several other Chinese apps.[24][25] U.S. President Donald Trump sought to ban U.S. "transactions" with WeChat through an executive order[26] but was blocked by a preliminary injunction issued in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California in September 2020.
WeChat provides a variety of features including text messaging, hold-to-talk voice messaging, broadcast (one-to-many) messaging, video calls and conferencing, video games, photograph and video sharing, as well as location sharing.[41] WeChat also allows users to exchange contacts with people nearby via Bluetooth, as well as providing various features for contacting people at random if desired (if people are open to it). It can also integrate with other social networking services such as Facebook and Tencent QQ.[42] Photographs may also be embellished with filters and captions, and automatic translation service is available and could also translate the conversation during messaging.
WeChat supports different instant messaging methods, including text messages, voice messages, walkie talkie, and stickers. Users can send previously saved or live pictures and videos, profiles of other users, coupons, lucky money packages, or current GPS locations with friends either individually or in a group chat. WeChat's character stickers, such as Tuzki, resemble and compete with those of LINE, a Japanese-South Korean messaging application.[43]
WeChat also provides a message recall feature[44] to allow users to recall and withdraw information (e.g. Images, documents) that are sent within 2 minutes in a conversation. To use this feature, users can select the message or file to be recalled by long pressing. In the menu that appears select 'recall' and 'ok' to complete the withdrawal process. Eventually, the selected messages or files will be removed from the WeChat chatting box on both the sender's and recipient's phones.
A distance sensing feature is implemented in WeChat. It has the ability to activate the receivers' hold-to-talk function when the phone was brought in close proximity to the ear. After the receiver was held at a certain distance from the ear, the sensor would then proceed to automatically disable the phone speakers. This feature eliminates the risk of the user's voice messages being inadvertently broadcast to the general public.[45]
WeChat users can register as a public account (), which enables them to push feeds to subscribers, interact with subscribers, and provide subscribers with services. Users can also create an official account, which fall under service, subscription, or enterprise accounts. Once users as individuals or organizations set up a type of account, they cannot change it to another type. By the end of 2014, the number of WeChat official accounts had reached 8 million.[46] Official accounts of organizations can apply to be verified (cost 300 RMB or about US$45). Official accounts can be used as a platform for services such as hospital pre-registrations,[47] visa renewal[48] or credit card service.[49] To create an official account, the applicant must register with Chinese authorities, which discourages "foreign companies".[50] In April 2022, WeChat announced that it will start displaying the location of users in China everytime they post on a public account. Meanwhile, overseas users on public accounts will also display the country based on their IP address.[51]
Privacy in WeChat works by groups of friends: only the friends from the user's contact are able to view their Moments' contents and comments. The friends of the user will only be able to see the likes and comments from other users only if they are in a mutual friend group. For example, friends from high school are not able to see the comments and likes from friends from a university. When users post their moments, they can separate their friends into a few groups, and they can decide whether this Moment can be seen by particular groups of people.[52] Contents posted can be set to "Private", and then only the user can view it. Unlike Sina Weibo or Instagram, these are only shared to the user's friends. These are unlikely to go viral.
Recently, WeChat launched a new foundation that users can choose to top their posts in their own Moments. No matter how long the posts can be viewed set by users, the posts topped by them can be seen all the time. This foundation enable people to mark some important posts that it will be easy to find them. Besides, users can permanently display some posts while ensuring overall privacy.
Users who have provided bank account information may use the app to pay bills, order goods and services, transfer money to other users, and pay in stores if the stores have a Weixin payment option. Vetted third parties, known as "official accounts", offer these services by developing lightweight "apps within the app".[53] Users can link their Chinese bank accounts, as well as Visa, MasterCard and JCB.[54]
WeChat Pay, officially referred to as Weixin Pay () in China, is a digital wallet service incorporated into Weixin, which allows users to perform mobile payments and send money between contacts.[55]
Although users receive immediate notification of the transaction, the Weixin Pay system is not an instant payment instrument, because the funds transfer between counterparts is not immediate.[56] The settlement time depends on the payment method chosen by the customer.
All Weixin users have their own Weixin Pay accounts. Users can acquire a balance by linking their Weixin account to their debit cards, or by receiving money from other users. For non-Chinese users of Weixin Pay, an additional identity verification process of providing a photo of a valid ID is required before certain functions of Weixin Pay become available. Users who link their credit card can only make payments to vendors, and cannot use this to top up WeChat balances. Weixin Pay can be used for digital payments, as well as payments from participating vendors.[57] As of March 2016, Weixin Pay had over 300 million users.[58]
Weixin Pay's main competitor in China and the market leader in online payments is Alibaba Group's Alipay. Alibaba company founder Jack Ma considered Weixin's red envelope feature to be a "Pearl Harbor moment", as it began to erode Alipay's historic dominance in the online payments industry in China, especially in peer-to-peer money transfer. The success prompted Alibaba to launch its own version of virtual red envelopes in its competing Laiwang service. Other competitors, Baidu Wallet and Sina Weibo, also launched similar features.[57]
In 2019 it was reported that Weixin had overtaken Alibaba with 800 million active Weixin mobile payment users versus 520 million for Alibaba's Alipay.[38][59] However Alibaba had a 54 per cent share of the Chinese mobile online payments market in 2017 compared to Weixin's 37 per cent share.[60] In the same year, Tencent introduced "WeChat Pay HK", a payment service for users in Hong Kong. Transactions are carried out with the Hong Kong dollar.[61] In 2019 it was reported that Chinese users can use WeChat Pay in 25 countries outside China, including, Italy, South Africa and the UK.[59] 152ee80cbc
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