Gionee found guilty of infecting 20M phones with malware to profit from users!

A court in China has found out that more than 20 million Gionee phones were intentionally inflicted with Trojan Horse via an app. 

File photo of Gionee K30 Pro

Planting the Trojan Horse through a software update

According to a report posted by a local Chinese publication, the court finally released its verdict where they found out that there's an illegal control of computer information systems on Gionee devices.

Gionee reportedly planted the malware on more than 20 million smartphones between December 2018 and October 2019. They used the Trojan Horse to get money from unsolicited ads and other malicious activities without the user's knowledge or consent.

The subsidiary of Gionee, Shenzhen Zhipu Technology Co. Ltd., has implanted a Trojan Horse through a software update using the so-called "Story Lock Screen" app. Through that update, the "Dark Horse Program" infected the first batch of smartphones way back in December 2018.  The malicious plug-in was used to carry out the illegitimate 'pull activities.'

The cybercrime continued until October 2019 and the company allegedly earned around USD 4.2 million while affecting 21.75 million Gionee devices. The expenses for that period are just a little short of USD 1.3 million.

Xu Li, Zhu Ying, Jia Zhengqiang, and Pan Qi were found guilty in the process of illegally controlling mobile devices and are sentenced from 3 to 3.5 years in prison plus a penalty of CNY 200,000 each.

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Via: GSMarena