Earlier this week, Apple announced that it was handing over operations of iCloud data services for customers in China to GCBD, who will manage the data in mainland China. The change is in an effort to comply with local laws.
While the change was only meant to affect customers in mainland China, select users outside of China also received an email telling them their data was affected and being given to GCBD. Apple now says, however, that some customers received that message in error…
As reported by TechCrunch, a number of Apple customers with U.S. and other country Apple IDs also received notification via email that their iCloud data would be handed off to GCBD. This, of course, raised concern for those users who seemingly should not be affected by the change.
Late last night, however, Apple informed those affected iCloud users that they in fact did receive the message in error. The email explained that no changes have been made to the accounts of those iCloud users outside of China and that “a very small number” of customers received the message in error:
Dear ____,
You recently received an email from us notifying you about an upcoming change for iCloud services in China. This email was sent in error. No changes have been made to your iCloud account.
We are very sorry that you received this email. This email was intended only for customers whose Apple ID country is China. A very small number of our customers whose Apple ID country is not China also received this email by mistake.
Notably, the email says the change only affects customers who have their Apple ID set to China. This, in theory, could mean that users in China who have their location set to another country could bypass the migration to GCBD.
Apple has been forced in several instances to change its practices to comply with local laws in China, and this is yet another case of that. Last year, Apple was forced to remove a slew of VPN applications from the App Store in China at the request of the Chinese government, a move that has been met with considerable criticism from some people.
Read more about how you can ensure your data isn’t migrated in our full walkthrough here.
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