Visitors at the booth of Bytedance Technology, which owns news aggregator app Jinri Toutiao and short video app Tik Tok, or Douyin, at the China International Software Expo in June in Beijing. Photo:VCG

Reported moves by some politicians in Japan's ruling party to put restrictions on Chinese apps, including short video app TikTok, reflects a Japanese effort to balance the country between China and the US, analysts said.

The comments came after the Nikkei reported that members of Japan's ruling party - the Liberal Democratic Party - is urging the Japanese government to restrict the use of Chinese-developed apps like TikTok due to pressure from the US. 

The grounds for the proposed restrictions would be the protection of sensitive data but the motive is to ensure Japan stays in international research and the exchange of talent with the US, it is reported. 

Those reported actions by Japanese politicians follow moves by India which moved to ban 59 Chinese apps, including WeChat and TikTok, in June following a bloody border clash. The US has also threatened to ban the TikTok. 

The most affected group of people would be young Japanese people, should the Japanese government enact such restrictions. But observers say the impact would be limited and will not affect China-Japan ties, as the two countries push economic, trade and investment cooperation in the post-COVID-19 time.

"This is just a proposal by an anti-China Japanese politician who routinely badmouths Beijing's rise. So it's just rhetoric," a Japan-based industry observer surnamed Chen told the Global Times. 

Chen's comment is echoed by another Tokyo-based Chinese analyst, who spoke on condition of anonymity. He noted that the chances are very slim that Japan will totally ban TikTok in the short-term due to the lack of related laws and a lengthy legislation procedure.

"It is not that easy compared with banning Huawei, as the latter mostly revolves around banning companies from purchasing, while limiting TikTok involves the general public," the analyst noted.

"The US has yet actually done anything that could deal a blow [to TikTok], so Japan is not likely to take action in advance," Chen added.

TikTok is gradually gaining popularity among Japan's young generation, but the user base is not large compared with that of India and the US. "So if there is a ban on the use of TikTok in Japan, the impact could be limited," Chen noted.

Amid strained China-US relations, Japan is struggling to find a balance between its political and economic interests so as to maximize its gains, Zhang Jifeng, vice director of the Institute of Japanese Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times Wednesday.

"Japan's economy is closely intertwined with China. China's massive market is also alluring for Japanese firms, so Tokyo won't risk infuriating its neighbor and may resist pressure from Washington," Zhang noted.

Per a Techcrunch report Wednesday, TikTok has consistently ranked at the top among entertainment apps and is the fifth-most downloaded app across all categories in the Japanese iOS store, citing data from research firm App Annie.


Newspaper headline: Japan politicians’ move against Chinese apps ‘rhetoric’