Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
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Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
1–10 of 45 posts
Re: Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
#2To the surprise of no one.
Re: Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
#3I wouldn't try to minimize this issue - it's terrible that the Chinese are trying to fit spyware into unbranded phones like this. Perhaps the bright side here is that when the Chinese do try to commit electronic espionage, they're pretty clumsy about it.
BUT...
Given the way smartphones everywhere are made - China and elsewhere - it's impossible for even technical users to know that their phones aren't spying on them. While most of the software running on your smartphone's application processor is now open-source (if you're in the Android majority), the software running on the baseband processor is 100% closed source and secret. We don't know anything about the horrible agreements that have been made between shady government agencies and the baseband manufacturers like Qualcom.
Re: Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
#4Of course, if you buy an iPhone in Europe, and you want to use it any significant manner, you're getting spied on by US agencies as well:
- GPS: the wifi and celltower db queries that optimize the service are transferred into a foreign country.
- use Siri: uploads your whole address book to US servers before use
- use iCloud tabs: every URL you visit it uploaded to Apple's US servers
- turn on the only cloud backup solution available on the device, and all your data, including every SMS, every call and all your most private notes and photos are also transferred into the foreign country of the US, with a chance of it being analyzed by certain agencies.
In other words, this might qualify as getting spied on as well.
Re: Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
#5Of course, if you buy an iPhone in Europe, and you want to use it any significant manner, you're getting spied on by US agencies as well: - GPS: the wifi and celltower db queries that optimize the service are transferred into a foreign country. - use Siri: uploads your whole address book to US servers before use - use iCloud tabs: every URL you visit it uploaded to Apple's US servers - turn on the only cloud backup s…
This is just speculation, although possible.
Whereas if you buy an Android phone in Europe, you know for certain that your data and behavior are being examined by Google, and are available to US agencies.
Re: Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
#6I wouldn't try to minimize this issue - it's terrible that the Chinese are trying to fit spyware into unbranded phones like this. Perhaps the bright side here is that when the Chinese do try to commit electronic espionage, they're pretty clumsy about it. BUT... Given the way smartphones everywhere are made - China and elsewhere - it's impossible for even technical users to know that their phones aren't spying on them…
False. The software running on your Android phone's application processor is not open source.
A significant fraction of it is based on a closed source fork of AOSP. The rest (both the Google Mobile Services layer, and the manufacturers customizations) are all closed source and have never been open.
Re: Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
#7Of course, if you buy an iPhone in Europe, and you want to use it any significant manner, you're getting spied on by US agencies as well: - GPS: the wifi and celltower db queries that optimize the service are transferred into a foreign country. - use Siri: uploads your whole address book to US servers before use - use iCloud tabs: every URL you visit it uploaded to Apple's US servers - turn on the only cloud backup s…
This is just speculation, although possible. Whereas if you buy an Android phone in Europe, you know for certain that your data and behavior are being examined by Google, and are available to US agencies.
What is speculation about this?
- wifi and celltower db query servers are indeed hosted outside EU
- Siri indeed uploads your whole address book - it even tells you about that beforehand!
- iCloud tabs must upload every URL to a central server, it would not work otherwise
- the mud puddle test* proves that iCloud backup is extractable from Apple servers by third parties.
*http://www.magnir.com/2012/08/how-secure-is-your-cloud-take-...
Re: Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
#8Um, why is there a running assumption that this is the Chinese government?
A Chinese manufacturer has even more incentive to steal information and sell it given the razor thin margins on making these phones.
Re: Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
#9There's a ton of these generic MTK-processor-based phones available online; I bought and played with a few a year or two ago. They range from "really crappy" to "pretty nice", but in most all cases you're stuck with the version of Android that they ship with, as there's no ongoing support, no upgrades from the vendor, etc.
Re: Report: Chinese phone comes preloaded with spyware
#10The entire american telecom infrastructure is rife with spyware. Why should chinese telecom be any different?