2014-08-12
A mobile phone user displays his Xiaomi smartphone in Jinan city, Shandong province, Aug. 6, 2014.
ImagineChina
Privacy infringements like that recently discovered in Xiaomi smartphones is common practice among Chinese digital service providers, analysts said on Tuesday.
Chinese mobile phone company Xiaomi has removed a “loophole” in its cloud messaging software after a report showed it was secretly sending the data to a server in China without notifying users.
The budget smartphone maker, which has a growing market in other developing countries, said the upgrade to its software had been launched on Sunday, and that users should now be able to opt out of the cloud messaging service.
Chinese netizens said they had waited several days for confirmation that Xiaomi really was uploading their private data, but that such treatment is common among Chinese service providers, who are often required to collect data by the government.
“[This] has been going on for a few days now, and finally we have some reliable confirmation that this is true,” user @FelixDing wrote on a popular social media site on Monday.
“To tell you the truth, I’m not at all surprised. Such privacy-violating practices are widespread among Chinese Internet companies, and they even think they can export their skulduggery to other countries,” the user wrote.
Nanjing-based database engineer Zhang Haoqi said Xiaomi’s statement wasn’t made available inside China, in Chinese, and that the company’s Chinese customers still had no idea where their data was ending up.
“We can’t rule out the possibility that they are uploading data and passing it to whomever, to whatever company or organization,” Zhang said.
He said privacy was still a relative concept for digital service providers.
“Whether or not they are respectful of certain boundaries depends largely on the laws and regulations of the countries in which they operate,” Zhang said.
“The boundaries exist, but they won’t be respected if companies aren’t restrained [by laws or regulatory bodies],” he added.
‘Back door’ surveillance
Guangzhou-based writer and online commentator Ye Du said a large number of apps inside China contain a “back door” to enable surveillance.
Beijing is also very concerned about the possibility that overseas corporations like Apple could get their hands on potentially sensitive user data.
