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| The U.S. government smartphone ships with Chinese malware |
A security researcher at Malwarebytes found that the US-funded Unimax U683CL smartphone provided pre-installed Chinese malware to low-income families that could not be removed without making the device unusable.
As part of the federal government's bailout guidance initiative, Assurance Wireless, a mobile operator in Virgin Mobile Group, sells low-tech smartphones manufactured and manufactured in China to low-income Americans.
Lifeline was launched in 1985 by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to make telecom services accessible to low-income consumers.
UMX U683CL costs only $ 35 via Lifeline and includes a Qualcomm Snapdragon 210 processor, 1GB RAM, 5 '' screen with 480p resolution and 2000mAh battery with Android Go.
However, the cheap phone price seems to be at the expense of confidentiality, because the Malwarebytes team has not found a case, but UMX 683CL had preinstalled malware in two cases.
Malwarebytes said it had received many complaints about pre-installed malicious apps on the phone by the end of 2019, bought a phone to investigate the allegations, and informed the company that sold the product of its discoveries they did not understand. any answer
According to the protection company, the first app, Adups, can be used as a wireless update, but other apps are installed automatically without user consent.
Adups collect a large amount of user data, including full text messages, contact lists, call logs with full phone numbers and unique device identifiers (including IMSI and IMEI), then transfer them to China.
Security researcher at Kryptowire Ryan Johnson found in 2016 that more than 700 million Android smartphones, including those in the United States, are equipped with auxiliary devices.
According to Malwarebytes, the second app in the UMX U686CL phone settings contains malware, so the program uses a code that contains Chinese characters.
This problem cannot be solved because disabling and uninstalling wireless updates prevents updates, the phone loses important security updates, the settings cannot be applied, and even if the user is able to do so, it cannot be uninstalled. Then he stops managing the phone.
Assurance Wireless has indicated that it knows the issue and contacts the Unimax device manufacturer to find out the reason. However, after our first tests, we felt that the application being shown was not a malicious program.