A recent Forbes report has implied that Xiaomi has been invading user privacy and collecting their data. Xiaomi has now refuted that claim with its own statement.
In the report, Gabi Cirlig, a cybersecurity researcher discovered that his smartphone has been tracking his usage and the data collected was sent to remote servers and rented by Xiaomi. Despite being in an incognito mode, most of his websites and search engine queries were tracked.
The researcher also pointed out that Xiaomi’s claim that the data was encrypted during transfer is not as secure as one would think. He could decode information using an easy encoding method — converting encrypted data into readable information in a matter of seconds.
In a statement posted on May 2, Xiaomi said, “We feel they have misunderstood what we communicated regarding our data privacy principles and privacy.” The company continued by explaining how aggregated data is collected and that these data will still be collected even under incognito mode.
“Furthermore, this is a common solution adopted by internet companies around the world to improve the overall user experience of various products, while safeguarding user privacy and data security.”
Still, the amount of ‘invasion’ does give individuals a reason to be worried. After all, Cirlig discovered that even Xiaomi’s music player app is also collecting information on his listening habits in addition to collecting data of the phone that could specifically pinpoint to the phone itself and ultimately, its owner.
In an attempt to soften the blow, Xiaomi finally added software updates for the Mi Browser, the Mi Browser Pro and Mint Browser. These updates will allow all its users to switch off the aggregated data collection if they want to.
