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posted by martyb on Wednesday November 16 2016, @02:19PM   Printer-friendly
from the who-owns-your-phone? dept.

Security firm Kryptowire discovered that an app in some BLU Android smartphones was transmitting personal user data to a Chinese server every three days.

The unlocked smartphone company BLU has now admitted that several of its handsets have been secretly sending out personal data collected from their owners. The data was transmitted via a third-party app that was installed on six of its phones.

According to The New York Times (paywalled article), the security firm Kryptowire first discovered that an app in some of BLU's phones was transmitting data to a Chinese server every 72 hours. It's not yet clear if the data was being mined for advertising purposes or to collect intelligence for the Chinese government. However, the story adds that the company that wrote the software, Shanghai Adups Technology Company, claims the app was made for a Chinese phone manufacturer to monitor users. It also claims it was not meant to be installed on handsets sold to a U.S. audience.

BLU has since admitted that about 120,000 of its phones "had been collecting unauthorized personal data in the form of text messages, call logs, and contacts from customers" via the "Wireless Update" app. The six phone models that were affected are the R1 HD, the Energy X Plus 2, the Studio Touch, the Advance 4.0 L2, the Neo XL, and the Energy Diamond.

Well, maybe that explains why BLU smartphones are so cheap...


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  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 16 2016, @02:26PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 16 2016, @02:26PM (#427516)

    I bought an advance 4.0 to have as a backup phone($89 all in) I have difficulty believing they intended to monitor anyone important at that price point so for there own citizens and to sell the data to the US government on there own undesirables

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  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 16 2016, @03:07PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 16 2016, @03:07PM (#427529)

    > I have difficulty believing they intended to monitor anyone important at that price point

    Gov people need burner phones too. In fact, anything a gov employee uses a burner phone for would be of the highest interest to an intelligence service because either its good for blackmail or its strategic info that they really want to keep off the record.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 16 2016, @03:52PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 16 2016, @03:52PM (#427554)

      Not a burner just unlocked..account sold separately

      as a side note looking at the one I bought the named services don't seem to be on it but there is a ton of other suspect sounding stuff can't decide if it's worth it to walk through and purge or just get a new backup phone

      • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 16 2016, @06:02PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 16 2016, @06:02PM (#427650)

        Your personal experience is not relevant to the question of whether or not this would be valuable for espionage.
        TL;DR cool story bro