China's industry ministry has told the country's Internet companies to end their long-standing practice of blocking each other's links on their sites

The move adds to the broader regulatory lockdown that is being undertaken by Beijing, with China wanting to end the so-called "walled gardens" set up by giant online firms - which blocks links and services by rivals on their respective platforms.

The industry ministry also says that it will take measures against those firms that fail to fall in line and once again this impacts the likes of Tencent, ByteDance, and Alibaba.