Taiwanese Government Investigates Xiaomi On Security Concerns
Will Xiaomi Be Proven Guilty
The Chinese company that manufactures Xiaomi is looking to expand its territories all over the world. It has opened an office in Brazil, but was not able to start business due to problems in the device certification process. India too has been a potential market for the Xiaomi smartphone. The product was launched in India and is successful with the partnership of Flipkart. Sales were huge giving the company a big boost in business. Another market that the Chinese company wants to target is Russia. The market in South America, India and Russia are huge and Xiaomi would like to tap into it. Android Headlines the site that brings together Android news states that according to reports from Russia Xiaomi is planning to sell its full range of products like smart TVs, smartphones and tablets in Russia. However, there are controversies surrounding this company.
The Chinese company is in trouble for sending user data to mainland China. This time the company is under investigation by the Taiwanese government as a cyber security threat, according to Reuters. The matter is supposed to get resolved within three months. According to the government statement Xiaomi's devices send user data to servers in China this could lead to security breaches. The Taiwanese government is performing independent test on the Xiaomi devices due to these allegations according to Gin-Shian Lou, a director at Taiwan's National Communications Commission.
Xiaomi was recently in the news for sending user information to mainland China. These accusations were made by security company F-Secure. It found that Xiaomi was sending user information to servers based in China. The Vice-president of the company Hugo Barra made a statement that this was to test whether text messages sent by users could be sent using data connection instead of the carrier's SMS gateway to save users money and he also said that the cloud services was not automatic, users could opt in if they wanted to.
Last Sept. 9, 2014 a Chinese news paper Apple Daily carried a story, that said a security solution's company Nexusguard Consulting found that Xiaomi devices sent user data to nine servers in China and this information was received by China Unicorn the telecommunication company owned by the state and two other internet companies that are based in Guangzhou and Beijing. This breach of user privacy had brought the company into media focus. Xiaomi also had a patch for the problem, but even with the patch Apple Daily found that the device sent user information automatically to these servers.
The company has not made any statements regarding these allegations by the media or the government. Nothing much is known about the results of the independent tests conducted by the Taiwanese government. If proven guilty the consequences the company will have to face are unknown.