Chinese smartphone giant Xiaomi is reassuring users by opening up the truth about its server operations in the wake of spying allegations last month.
Xiaomi's global vice president Hugo Barra told The Wall Street Journal that users’ personal information is not stored on the server in Beijing that sparked cyberspying rumors last month, and that Xiaomi only stores personal information on different servers with users’ permission.
The rumors had begun when a user posted online in mid-July that his RedMi Note smartphone was “secretly” connecting to a server in Beijing, although he had turned off the data backup functions. The server was connecting to his phone’s media storage application, so he believed his photos and other data were being sent to Beijing. With consumers already wary in general about data privacy, the allegations took off across the Internet.
Xiaomi reacted quickly. Chinese and U.S. tech firms have been on tenterhooks over cyberspying allegations in the past year, as their governments battle out what some have likened to a “digital cold war.”
Barra, who left Google for Xiaomi in 2013, told the Journal that the server in question in Beijing stores no user data and only connects to users’ phones for services such as downloading themes and apps. If users choose to back up their data with Xiaomi’s cloud service, their data is encrypted and stored in different servers located in China and other countries, he said.
“The Xiaomi servers the device was connecting to in this post are part of our infrastructure used for push services and downloading of static application data – and not Mi Cloud servers (which have a different IP address),” he wrote in an emailed response. Mi Cloud is Xiaomi’s cloud data backup service.
Barra also posted a less-detailed Q&A last week saying the user’s post was “severely misinterpreted” and that Xiaomi did not upload personal information without the permission of its users.
Regarding allegations that the Beijing server was automatically connecting to a user’s smartphone media storage application, Barra said the server was not connecting to photos and other data, but to the device’s download manager. The download manager runs in the media server system process and accesses the media storage data base to store downloaded files, he said.
“The Media Storage application also handles photos, which incorrectly led to the impression that photos are being uploaded, which is not the case,” Barra wrote. “The connection to the IP address shown in the post is only being used for the Download Manager push service.”
Xiaomi's global vice president Hugo Barra told The Wall Street Journal that users’ personal information is not stored on the server in Beijing that sparked cyberspying rumors last month, and that Xiaomi only stores personal information on different servers with users’ permission.
Xiaomi reacted quickly. Chinese and U.S. tech firms have been on tenterhooks over cyberspying allegations in the past year, as their governments battle out what some have likened to a “digital cold war.”
Barra, who left Google for Xiaomi in 2013, told the Journal that the server in question in Beijing stores no user data and only connects to users’ phones for services such as downloading themes and apps. If users choose to back up their data with Xiaomi’s cloud service, their data is encrypted and stored in different servers located in China and other countries, he said.
“The Xiaomi servers the device was connecting to in this post are part of our infrastructure used for push services and downloading of static application data – and not Mi Cloud servers (which have a different IP address),” he wrote in an emailed response. Mi Cloud is Xiaomi’s cloud data backup service.
Barra also posted a less-detailed Q&A last week saying the user’s post was “severely misinterpreted” and that Xiaomi did not upload personal information without the permission of its users.
Regarding allegations that the Beijing server was automatically connecting to a user’s smartphone media storage application, Barra said the server was not connecting to photos and other data, but to the device’s download manager. The download manager runs in the media server system process and accesses the media storage data base to store downloaded files, he said.
“The Media Storage application also handles photos, which incorrectly led to the impression that photos are being uploaded, which is not the case,” Barra wrote. “The connection to the IP address shown in the post is only being used for the Download Manager push service.”
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