Xiaomi smartphones can censor and send user information to China? That’s what Lithuanians say
Xiaomi smartphones regularly receive a list of prohibited words that are subject to censorship. Additionally, they can send information about user activities to external servers, say experts from the Cybersecurity Center under the Lithuanian Ministry of National Defense.
The Lithuanian Cybersecurity Center, which is part of the Ministry of National Defense, published a report according to which Xiaomi smartphones send encrypted information about activities performed on the phone to external servers. Lithuanian experts also found a module that allows censoring information downloaded to the phone.
According to the report, several manufacturer’s applications installed on the phone – including the Mi Browser web browser – may censor downloaded information. They receive periodic updates of words and phrases to be censored from an external server, and the device automatically blocks sending content with phrases from the list. When the report was published on September 21, the list included 449 words and phrases, including: “Free Tibet”, “Democratic Movement”, “Taiwan Independence”, etc.
The editorial team of “Wprost” asked the Xiaomi representative office in Poland to clarify the matter. The company sent a short statement denying the allegations. Full text of the statement at the end of the article.
