Recently, the China Judgment Network issued a judgment that determined that the computer information system implemented in Gionee mobile phones was illegally controlled.
According to the court’s detailed information, between December 2018 and October 2019, more than 20 million Gionee phones were deliberately infringed by Trojan horse malware through an application.
The application becomes a tool for profiting from users through unsolicited advertisements and other illegal means.
The court ruled that Beijing Baice Technology Co., Ltd. and the defendant Shenzhen Zhipu Technology Co., Ltd. (a subsidiary of Gionee) connive, by updating the “story lock screen”, the Trojan horse program was implanted in the user’s Gionee mobile phone, without the user’s knowledge, using the Pull method will automatically update the software on the affected Gionee phone.
Due to the low efficiency of the existing “pull” method, Wang Dengke suggested in December 2018 that the hot update plug-in “Dark Horse Platform” be implanted in applications such as “Story Lock Screen”.
The application and its SDK version with Trojan plug-in were upgraded, and then the “Dark Horse Platform” was used to install and update the “Living Trojan Horse” without the user’s knowledge, thereby improving the efficiency of Pull operations. The proposal was implemented that month.
Court details show that from December 2018 to October 2019, Beijing Baice Co. and Shenzhen Zhipu Company successfully carried out 2.88 billion “pull” activities.
Since April 2019, the number of devices covered by the monthly “pull activities” has exceeded 21.75 million, of which 26,519,921 Gionee phones were involved in October 2019 alone.
In terms of revenue, these companies are expected to receive 27.85 million yuan from Beijing Baice Co’s “pull” business, while its estimated cost is 8.425 million yuan.
The court sentenced the defendant Shenzhen Zhipu Technology Co., Ltd. to the crime of illegally controlling the computer information system; the defendants Xu Li, Zhu Ying, Jia Zhengqiang, and Pan Qi were convicted of illegally controlling the computer information system and sentenced to three years and six months in prison respectively, and a fine of 200,000 yuan. .
For the sake of clarity, Shenzhen Zhipu Technology Co., Ltd. is a subsidiary of Shenzhen Gionee Communication Equipment Co., Ltd. Industrial and commercial filings show that Shenzhen Gionee holds 85% of Shenzhen Zhipu’s shares.
Shenzhen Zhipu Company’s business scope includes computer software technology development, advertising business and the use of information network to operate game products.
The registered capital is 10 million yuan, and the legal representative is Xu Li.
In a report published in August this year, this practice is common in cheap Chinese mobile phones, which found that malware in Infinix and Tecno phones can steal users’ money.
