IAF personnel cautioned against using the phones.
By Dileep Thekkethil
BANGALORE: Xiaomi, the smartphone manufacturer that became No. 1 in China, much to the envy of top brands including Apple and Samsung, is under the scanner in India and Taiwan as officials were advised not to use Xiaomi smartphones owing to cyber security threats.
Xiaomi is currently engaged in changing its Beijing-based server to a server operated by Amazon.com in California and Singapore. The transfer of data to these servers started early this year and is expected to complete soon. According to the official statement, only the data of users outside China is being moved and this includes India; a comparatively new market for Xiaomi.
Hugo Barra, Vice President of Xiaomi wrote in the official Google+ page that, “We’re moving your data! In early 2014, we kicked off a massive internal effort to expand our server infrastructure globally in order to better serve Mi fans everywhere.”
According to his statement, when the data is migrated to the new server users can experience better and faster service, coupled with “high privacy standards and comply with local data protection regulations.”
Xiaomi’s majority user base is located in China. However, the company had expanded its market to India and Taiwan earlier this year. In India, Xiaomi partnered with Flipkart, the online retailer, and sold two models of smartphones, Mi3 and Redmi 1S via a series of flash sales, creating a huge buzz around the low cost smartphone with high-end specifications.
Indian Air Force (IAF) personnel were cautioned from the top on Tuesday, asking them and their family members to abstain from using Xiaomi smartphones. This caution was sent soon after the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) reported cases of Xiaomi mobile phones sending users’ data to its servers in China.
The Finland based security firm F-Secure had alleged earlier that Xiaomi smartphones and tablets were redirecting data to a Beijing-based server. Government ministries in Taiwan asked officials to investigate about possible security concerns on Xiaomi smartphones and tablets.
Xiaomi is also facing trouble in the mainland as the Chinese protestors who demand elections in China raised suspicion of Xiaomi’s nexus with the Chinese officials for spying on their Mi smartphones.
The transfer of data to the Amazon server is scheduled to happen on three phases – E-commerce migration, MIUI services migration and Going local.
Barra also wrote “Our primary goal in moving to multi-site server architecture was to improve the performance of our services for Mi fans around the world. This is a very high priority for Xiaomi as we expand into new markets over the next few years.”
The growth of Xiaomi to the No.1 spot was unprecedented. The company was founded just four years ago and it was able to find firm ground in the Chinese market in a short span of time. Xiaomi surpassed Samsung in the second quarter of the year, becoming the largest smartphone manufacturer in China.
Lei Jun, the founder of Xiaomi, was quoted saying that he dreams of conquering the world and people in Xiaomi believe that like China, India can become one of its biggest markets for their smartphone.