‘Censorship spyware’ lurks inside Chinese smartphones

HUNDREDS of thousands of British consumers are using Chinese smartphones embedded with “authoritarian” software capable of blocking phrases such as “Free Tibet” and “long live Taiwan independence”, it has been claimed.

Xiaomi’s handsets are able to automatically flag up and hide phrases offensive to Communist rulers according to a disclosure by Lithuania’s defence ministry, which has warned the public not to buy the device.

Although the capability, discovered in the Mi 10T 5G model, has been switched off for the European market, it could be activated remotely at any time.

Xiaomi has around a 6 per cent share of the UK smartphone market, according to the data company Strategy Analytics, meaning up to a million people own its phones.

Tom Tugendhat, the chairman of the foreign affairs select committee, said: “We need to look out for the spread of digital authoritarianism as it is increasingly programmed into our hardware, not just our world.”

The scandal has echoes of a long-running row over Huawei, another Chinese telecom business. Western countries, including Britain, have stripped Huawei kit out of their 5G networks because of concerns over national security.

Alan Woodward, a computer science expert at the University of Surrey and former consultant for GCHQ, said: “Absolutely [consumers] should be concerned. Censorship technology may be standard in some jurisdictions, but unless those vendors are transparent about what is included then buyers simply cannot make an informed choice.”

The Xiaomi revelation is the latest in a long line of scandals over Chinese censorship. The country tightly controls what users can see on the internet, and has pressured Western countries such as Apple into following its rules when operating on the mainland.

Almost 450 words and phrases were found to have been blacklisted by Xiaomi. When detected, “the device filters that content and the user cannot see it”, Lithuania’s NKSC security agency said.

A Xiaomi spokesman said: “Xiaomi’s devices do not censor communications to or from its users. Xiaomi has never and will never restrict or block any personal behaviours of our smartphone users, such as searching, calling, web browsing or the use of third-party communication software.

“Xiaomi fully respects and protects the legal rights of all users.”

Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre declined to comment.