Apple's China partner bars workers from leaving premises to shut out Covid

The firm, which also manages data for other clients, didn't say whether the iPhone maker's servers had been affected or when the lockdown will lift

China’s latest Covid lockdown has virtually paralyzed a city of 6 million that houses much of the country’s electronic information, forcing Apple Inc.’s datacenter operator to take emergency measures to shut out the pandemic.

Apple’s partner in Guiyang, which operates the server center that houses all online data generated and stored by hundreds of millions of Chinese iPhone users, described what amounted to a “closed loop” system under which employees are barred from leaving the premises. Many haven’t seen their families for a week, Guizhou Cloud Big Data, Apple’s government-backed partner, said in a WeChat notice. 

The firm, which also manages data