The WeChat app in the App Store on a smartphone. (ANDREW HARRER/BLOOMBERG)

Chinese tech giant Tencent Holdings has changed the name of its WeChat Work office collaboration app to WeCom, setting it up as a potential alternative to its messaging app WeChat ahead of a US ban.

Tencent, registered the WeCom trademark on Aug 19, according to the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Two Tencent sources said WeCom does not fall under the scope of a ban on WeChat-related transactions in the US from Sept 20

Two Tencent sources said WeCom does not fall under the scope of a ban on WeChat-related transactions in the United States from Sept 20, one of a series of US measures cracking down on Chinese tech firms and apps that Washington says are threats to national security.

Tencent declined to comment.

After downloading WeCom, users can now link their WeChat account to it and add their WeChat contacts, a Reuters test showed. WeCom users can then message, create chat groups, and even receive virtual money from WeChat friends without their WeChat contacts having to download WeCom.

ALSO READ: Too many WeChat work groups a drain on workers

There was no indication that Tencent has actively promoted WeCom in the United States. There has also been no surge in downloads of WeCom in recent weeks, according to Sensor Tower.

WeCom workaround

Tencent staff in the United States have historically used WeChat Work to communicate with the company’s headquarters in Shenzhen. Tencent has at least 250 US-based employees.

The WeCom mobile app has been gaining popularity in China, where downloads in the first part of September rose 74 percent from about 690,000 during the first 16 days of August. Downloads were 158 percent higher than the same period a year ago.

But the app has gained little traction in the United States. New US installs so far in September stand at about 3,000, unchanged from the same period in August and up from 1,000 during the first part of September last year.

Nina Wei, a Chinese entrepreneur in Seattle, said she used WeCom mostly to connect with business contacts in China but hadn’t used it much recently as a number of projects had fallen apart amid deteriorating Sino-US relations.

She was unaware that WeCom was a potential workaround.

“I haven’t connected my WeCom to my WeChat yet as I was hoping to keep my work life and private life separate.”

Bid to block ban

WeChat users in the US revived their request in court to block the Trump administration’s restrictions on the app, ahead of a Sunday deadline to remove it from American stores.

This is nothing more than an unprecedented prior restraint on protected speech, on the press, on the right to assemble and petition the government and the free exercise of religion. It is anything but "narrowly tailored;" it is a sledgehammer.

US WeChat Users Alliance

The US WeChat Users Alliance is trying again, as directed by a San Francisco judge, after the Commerce Department issued a detailed description Friday of what transactions will be prohibited. The judge is set to consider the group’s arguments at a hearing Saturday at 1:30 pm California time.

READ MORE: WeChat users sue to block Trump’s ban of messaging app

WeChat will have to end payments through its service as of Sunday and will be prohibited from getting technical services from vendors, according to the Commerce Department. Downloads of the app will also be barred as of Sunday. But the government said users won’t be penalized for personal and business communications.

“This is nothing more than an unprecedented prior restraint on protected speech, on the press, on the right to assemble and petition the government and the free exercise of religion,” the group said in its new request to halt the ban. “It is anything but ‘narrowly tailored;’ it is a sledgehammer.”

US Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler said the users group’s earlier request to block the president’s Aug 6 executive order was too vague and mooted by the government’s announcement of the specific scope of the restrictions aimed at WeChat and its Chinese parent company, Tencent Holdings Ltd.

ALSO READ: US' WeChat ban brings cold war with China into a billion homes

The users’ group said the Commerce Department’s explanation of prohibited use doesn’t address its concerns.

“The prohibitions of the Executive Order, including the imposition of criminal and civil penalties, without additional notice, are effective on Sunday, but what acts are prohibited and by whom, remain vague and unclear,” they said.

The administration has said the ban is driven by national security concerns about the Chinese government’s ability to access data through the app. Trump has separately barred people in the US from doing business with TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance Ltd.

The Justice Department urged the judge not to grant the users’ request, saying in a filing Friday the national security and foreign policy interests at issue are readily apparent and compelling.

The WeChat users’ group has said that Trump’s order is driven by election-year politics.

“What we have feared has happened,” the group said in a statement. “Despite the public ‘assurances’ provided by the Department of Justice to the court on Wednesday that individual users will not be affected, the US government is banning WeChat completely.”

The case is US WeChat Users Alliance v. Trump, 3:20-cv-5910, US District Court, District of Northern California (San Francisco).

Download surge

IPhone users in the US are rushing to install messaging app WeChat days before the download ban takes effect on Sunday.

WeChat downloads surged to make it the 100th most-downloaded app in the US on Friday, according to mobile analytics firm SensorTower. It has typically ranked between 1,000th and 1,500th this year

WeChat downloads surged to make it the 100th most-downloaded app in the US on Friday, according to mobile analytics firm SensorTower. It has typically ranked between 1,000th and 1,500th this year. Friday is the first time the app has entered the top 500 so far in 2020, a spokesperson for SensorTower said in an email.

TikTok’s ranking as the fourth-most popular app on the iPhone store was unchanged on Friday, SensorTower said. It hasn’t dropped out of the top 15 for all of 2020.

The video-sharing app’s owner ByteDance Ltd is negotiating a deal to hand control of its US operations and data to Oracle Corp in order to satisfy US concerns that the data of Americans who use the app could fall into the hands of the Chinese government. TikTok will still be able to do business with American companies until Nov 12. That means the app, which is extremely popular with young Americans, will likely keep working for users until after the Nov 3 presidential election.

Chinese officials, who will have to approve the final TikTok deal, have called the US actions against the two apps “economic bullying.”