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Move-to-earn app STEPN to limit service in China

STEPN on Friday said it would stop providing Global Positioning System (GPS) and Internet Protocol (IP) location services to users in mainland China starting mid-July.

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Fast facts

  • STEPN said the move was made to abide by Chinese regulations and that it had never engaged in any business on the mainland.

  • China’s new Personal Information Protection Law that came into effect on Nov. 1 requires any cross-border data transfers to be submitted first to the cyber and data protection regulator there.

  • It wasn’t immediately clear how STEPN services could be used after July 15 without the tracking of GPS and IP data.

  • STEPN did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

  • Jerry H, one of STEPN’s founders, said in a Discord channel that less than 5% of its users are from mainland China.

  • The price of STEPN’s token GMT has dropped 38.10% in the last 24 hours to $0.8473, according to CoinMarketCap.

  • See Wan Toong, the CTO of the Singapore-based game developer Red Door Digital, told Forkast that China is always a market that attracts interest, but the question will be regarding regulation.

  • “The China market is still worth engaging, and will become increasingly accessible when regulation becomes clearer,” said Toong.

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