Calamity

Like I just commented, because American companies aren't slaves to a government "master". As much as we sometimes like to hate on Google/FB and other big tech, their size allows them to act as a balance of power against an overly-invasive government.

For example, WhatsApp (and Messenger) being E2EE by default(with confidence through audits) is completely counter to what a government seeking full public surveillance would want. Same thing with Apple's encrypted phones.

The government can't just waltz in and ask for the data as a) the companies can't help even if they wanted through the very nature of the in-built encryption b) the government can't threaten to shut them down without public uproar

Indeed, in the west we are lucky (in some sense) that our tech is big enough that it is able to band together and stand up against unreasonable demands from the government.

In China, I can't imagine Huawei/Tencent/etc refusing to help the government break into someone's phone or create a backdoor into an "encrypted" chat.

Something makes me feel that it is down to their general approach to privacy and not just the portion of it that is "within China".