India orders GitHub to remove Jack Dorsey’s Bitchat

India’s Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) ordered GitHub to remove and disable three code repositories for Bitchat within three hours, saying the Bluetooth mesh app impedes lawful interception and could be misused during protests or internet shutdowns. The notice identified the main project, the Android build and the Android releases page under the “permissionlesstech” account.

The notice, issued Thursday by I4C under the Ministry of Home Affairs, invoked Section 79(3)(b) of the Information Technology Act, 2000 and Rule 3(1)(d) of the 2021 IT Rules. It directed GitHub to “remove and disable access” to the named repositories while preserving any evidence, and referenced provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.

I4C described Bitchat as a serverless, peer-to-peer app that routes messages directly between nearby phones over a Bluetooth mesh. The agency noted the app operates without internet access, central servers, phone numbers or user accounts and said that architecture “significantly impedes lawful interception, attribution, and investigation.” The notice warned the software could be exploited during “public disorder, riots, terrorism, organized crime, or internet shutdowns.”

The order came as youth-led protests over alleged exam-paper leaks drew large crowds in central Delhi. Demonstrators rallied under the Cockroach Janta Party banner and authorities restricted mobile internet around Parliament and the Jantar Mantar protest site. Organizers and some participants made use of offline communication tools, including Bitchat, when cellular or internet services were limited or cut.

Jack Dorsey, founder of the app and CEO of Block, posted the I4C notice on social media and wrote, “government of india does not like technologies like bitchat.” The Bitchat Community account responded, “Governments that fear people talking without permission will always go after the tools that make it possible.” The Internet Freedom Foundation, a digital-rights group, described the takedown as “unconstitutional and authoritarian,” adding the order named no unlawful content and bypassed formal blocking procedures.

China ordered Apple to remove Bitchat from its App Store in April and banned Damus, a related decentralized app, in 2023. Regulators in both countries cited concerns about peer-to-peer apps’ ability to mobilize public opinion without state oversight. Removing an app from an official store restricts distribution; taking down source code aims to limit re-creation. Open-source repositories can be copied and mirrored, and copies of the Bitchat repositories appeared on the decentralized platform GitLawb within hours of India’s order.

Microsoft-owned GitHub has not publicly confirmed whether it complied with the three-hour deadline. Block has taken steps to reduce reliance on centralized code hosting, including the recent launch of Buzz, a decentralized platform. Dorsey has previously expressed support for alternatives to mainstream app and code distribution systems.

Legal and technical disputes are likely to determine the future availability of Bitchat’s code. Indian authorities based the notice on specific IT Act provisions and the 2021 intermediary rules, while civil-liberties groups argue the action did not point to particular illegal content and did not follow established blocking procedures. The outcome may depend on any further action by GitHub, the spread of mirrored repositories, and potential court challenges.