Although it is not yet clear which type of data is being shared, and which Chinese company is receiving this data, but from the evidences collected so far, it seems that privacy and security of all Reliance Jio chat app users is being severely compromised.
At the time of writing, there has been no clarification from Reliance Jio management regarding this incident of data breach.
Data Transported to Chinese IP
AnonOpsIndia decompiled the application’s APK file, and found references of a Chinese IP address. They decompiled another file from the app, and found the references of the same Chinese app via strings written in Chinese language.They immediately shared the Chinese IP addresses, which are receiving this data of Indian users: “124.193.183.96:8086″, “poc.gongsunda.com:8083″, “www.rsocial.net:8087″, “acp.jiobuzz.com:8090″
They created a hashtag on Twitter: #OpStopReliance, and shared thei
Reliance Jio Chat app was launched in April this year, and we had done a detailed review of it’s features, and found it excellent. Loaded with chat, voice call and creative emojis, we had recommended this app to our users.
However, having said that, this new security breach which was discovered few days back has alarmed us, and we are expecting a reply from Reliance Jio regarding this attack on our privacy.
At a time when Reliance Jio is trying to disrupt the Indian telecom market with superfast, and dirt cheap Internet plans, this disturbing allegations of data breach certainly comes as a shocker.
We will keep you updated as more details come in.
Disclaimer: We have verified these screenshots of the code with a senior security analyst, who has informed us that the data is certainly being sent to a Chinese IP, without any prior information or alert. He has informed us that although anyone can download an app, and decompile the code, such minute reverse engineering of the APK is subjected to the terms and conditions of the app creators. We are not yet sure whether such decompilation falls under the safety of legal proceedings or not. None the less, if any user information is being unofficially transported, it is against the existing privacy law.
Blogger Comment
Facebook Comment