PUBG Mobile terminates services, access for users from today

There's bad news for PUBG fans as PUBG Mobile will terminate its services in India on October 30. The PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, popularly knowns as PUBG, announced on Facebook that it will shut down access and servers in India today.

PUBG Mobile wrote, "Dear Fans, To comply with the interim order of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology dated September 2, 2020, Tencent Games will terminate all service and access for users in India to PUBG MOBILE Nordic Map: Livik and PUBG MOBILE Lite (together, "PUBG Mobile") on October 30, 2020. The rights to publish PUBG MOBILE in India will be returned to the owner of the PUBG intellectual property".

The gaming app reiterated that protecting users' data has always been its top priority. PUBG said, "Protecting user data has always been a top priority and we have always complied with applicable data protection laws and regulations in India. All users' gameplay information is processed in a transparent manner as disclosed in our privacy policy. We deeply regret this outcome, and sincerely thank you for your support and love for PUBG MOBILE in India".

Although, the government had banned PUBG Mobile in September owing to security reasons, some users who already had them installed on their phones, tablets and PCs could still access the game.

India on September 2 banned PUBG Mobile Nordic Map: Livik and PUBG Mobile Lite, along with 118 apps with links to China.

These apps were "prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of the state and public order," IT Ministry said. Post the ban, both PUBG Mobile and PUBG  Mobile Lite were removed from app stores.

With the PUBG India servers shutting down today, it is going to be difficult for users to play the game in the country. However, it is suspected that using VPN or proxy will let some users bypass the restrictions.

Meanwhile, indigenous multiplayer action game FAU-G, which was announced after the ban of PUBG, has been confirmed to launch in November this year. The game is created by an Indian gaming company nCore to fill the void of PUBG Mobile. India was PUBG's biggest market before the game was blacklisted with more than 175 million downloads to date.

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