In a shocking revelation by a security firm Kryptowire, some Android phones were caught sending sensitive and personal data to China using secret ‘backdoor’ software.
This information was confirmed on Kryptowire’s website on Tuesday, where the firm also added that these infected Android devices are pre-installed with software which then collects and sends personal data, like their text messages and geographical location, to some unauthorised third-party in China.
Although the exact purpose of this data mining is unknown for now, there are speculations that either the data is used for advertisements, or it is used to send intelligence to the Chinese government, as reported by the New York Times.
The premier new agency also claimed that out of all smartphone users, international customers and prepaid phone users were most vulnerable to the eavesdropping. And if you are calming yourself by thinking that this is just one of those hysteria news, the company which wrote the software, Shanghai Adups Technology Company, themselves confirmed that the code is still working and sending data from over 700 million phones, cars and other smart devices.
This revelation would never have been unearthed had it not been for an inexpensive BLU R1 HD phone. One of the researchers at Kryptowire noticed some unusual network activity during this phone’s setup process. And when it was investigated further, the signals were found to be personal text messages to a server of Adups based in Shanghai, China.
And no, you can’t even delete it or stop it, as no mobile anti-virus protection is capable of finding and deleting an inbuilt functionality, and it assumes that every company installed thing is not malware. According to the New York Times, BLU Products claimed that over 120,000 of its phones are considered to be affected by this, and they are now looking to send an update to eliminate the feature.
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