ZyMix, a messaging and payments app being marketed to British university students, runs on servers owned by Tencent Holdings, a Chinese company on a US military blacklist over alleged links to the People's Liberation Army.
The app, branded as the UK's first "super app for gen Z," combines chat, payments and community features. Tencent is a conglomerate based in Shenzhen. ZyMix accesses Tencent's infrastructure through a German-based subsidiary of the Chinese firm, according to The Guardian.
The US Department of Defense has placed Tencent on its military blacklist. The Pentagon alleges the company has affiliations with China's People's Liberation Army, though the source material does not detail the specific nature or evidence of those alleged connections.
ZyMix is being promoted on UK university campuses. The app's positioning targets Gen Z users with integrated messaging, financial transactions and social networking in a single platform.
The use of infrastructure from a blacklisted company raises questions about data security and oversight for a service aimed at British students. The source material does not address whether UK regulators have reviewed the app's infrastructure, privacy practices or whether they have raised concerns about the use of servers connected to a US-blacklisted entity. Neither does it detail ZyMix's response to the disclosure or whether the company has plans to migrate away from Tencent's servers.