Yahoo shuts down its news websites in India over FDI rules

Yahoo has shut down its news websites in India due to the new foreign direct investment rules that limit foreign ownership of digital content platforms in the country. These include Yahoo News, Yahoo Cricket, Yahoo Finance, Entertainment and MAKERS India.

This, however, will not affect Yahoo Mail and Search in India.

“As of August 26th, 2021, Yahoo India will no longer be publishing content. Your Yahoo Account, Mail and Search experiences will not be affected in any way and will operate as usual. We thank you for your support and readership,” a notice on the Yahoo website read. “In case you are a Yahoo Mail user, this change does not affect you in any way. This development does not impact our products Yahoo Mail and Yahoo Search, where we will continue to serve users in India as before, without any change.”

Verizon Communications Inc. had acquired Yahoo in 2017.

“We did not come to this decision lightly. However, Yahoo India has been impacted by changes to regulatory laws in India that now limit foreign ownership of media companies that operate and publish digital content in India,” the company said. “Yahoo has had a long association with India and we are really proud of the premium, local content we have provided our users here for the last 20 years.”

Given that Yahoo Cricket has a ‘news’ component, “it was impacted under the new FDI regulations that limit foreign ownership of media companies that operate and publish digital content in India in the ‘News and Current Affairs’ space”.

Thanking all its users in India for the “support and trust” over the past two decades, Yahoo said it remains “open to opportunities that connect us to users here”.

According to the new FDI regulations that will come into effect in October, digital media companies in India can accept up to 26% investment in the form of foreign investment, subject to approval from the central government.