Gionee in trouble! Chinese court says it planted malware in 21 million phones
We very often hear reports that Google is removing apps from its Play Store to install malware on users’ smartphones. Now a smartphone maker has been found guilty of doing the same.
The Chinese Judgment Documents Network has found Gionee guilty of implanting malware in more than 20 million smartphones to take advantage of users through unsolicited ads and other means.
According to a report from GizChina, Shenzhen Zhipu Technology Co Ltd, which is a subsidiary of Gionee, implanted a Trojan in Gionee smartphones through an update of the ‘Story Lock Screen’ app from December 2018 to October 2019. The company used ‘Dark Horse Platform’ to install and update ‘Living Trojan Horse’ to over 21.75 million users without the knowledge of users in an attempt to increase usage and clicks on its platform for game advertisers.
The report states that the technique helped the company earn 27.85 million RMB or 31.46 crore between the mentioned period.
