Remember back in August when the Trump administration made noise about trying to ban WeChat and Tencent from transactions with folks in the US? It caused a big ripple at the time, as it was written to effectively include all of Tencent’s holdings, including its games studios, everything from Riot and Epic to Funcom and Grinding Gear. While officials told press the executive order would not affect Tencent’s game studio holdings, we were all pretty skeptical oh how that would play out.
That skepticism was apparently warranted, as last night Bloomberg reported on sources from Fortnite developer Epic Games and League of Legends developer Riot Games who have admitted that the Trump administration has “inquire[d] about their security protocols in handling Americans’ personal data” in relation to Tencent. Neither the government nor companies responded to Bloomberg’s request for comment on the record, but headlines this morning are already moving on to the impending ban of WeChat and TikTok this weekend.
Epic Games, Riot Games and other gaming companies where Tencent have a minority / majority stake have been sent letters from the CFIUS to inquire about personal data security.
Moves comes amid increased scrutiny over Tencent's operations in the US, such as WeChat. https://t.co/kJNJL3Z1Tj
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) September 17, 2020
