Ministry of Electronics and IT( MeitY) has issued notices to Google and Apple with directions to remove seven applications including BAT- BMS, SMART BMS, Loggisy from their respective app stores linked to reports of e-rickshaws being remotely disabled due to the misuse of the apps.
MeitY Secretary S. Krishnan told reporters on the sidelines of the CII Cybersecurity Summit that the apps had come to the ministry’s attention a day earlier and were removed soon after. He added that app stores carry a duty of care and that the government would engage with them directly to keep potentially harmful software off their platforms.
“There are a couple of apps which came up to our notice yesterday. They have been taken down from the app stores,” Krishnan said. This traces back to social media videos that began circulating a few days before, showing people disabling nearby e-rickshaws by connecting to their battery systems over Bluetooth.
Bluetooth Exploit
These apps are companion utilities for Bluetooth-enabled lithium-ion battery management systems, designed to let users check readings like voltage, current, temperature and charge cycles but also included a toggle to switch a connected battery’s power output on or off.
Because the connection works over Bluetooth rather than requiring the vehicle’s own credentials, reports suggested a nearby stranger could interrupt a rickshaw’s power supply without the driver’s knowledge, and likely interrupt vehicles in motion. The Chinese applications have been subsequently pulled from the Apple and Google app stores following the ministry’s intervention.
Beyond Pranks
In the days before the removal, several e-rickshaw operators reported sudden, unexplained stoppages while driving — incidents later believed to be connected to people nearby using the apps to interfere with their vehicles’ battery systems, sometimes described as a prank rather than organised fraud. The disruptions raised safety concerns given e-rickshaws’ role as a common last-mile transport option in Indian cities and towns.
This takedown has been framed with the lens of digital oversight- as more physical devices, from vehicles to home electronics, are paired with companion apps, the government wants app marketplaces to screen more carefully for software that could be misused to interfere with connected hardware or facilitate fraud, rather than relying on user complaints to surface problems.