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Shopping app Temu is “dangerous malware,” spying on your texts, U.S. lawsuit claims (arstechnica.com)

submitted 1 month ago by tardigrada@beehaw.org to c/technology@beehaw.org

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Temu—the Chinese shopping app that has rapidly grown so popular in the US that even Amazon is reportedly trying to copy it—is "dangerous malware" that's secretly monetizing a broad swath of unauthorized user data, Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin alleged in a lawsuit filed Tuesday.

Griffin cited research and media reports exposing Temu's allegedly nefarious design, which "purposely" allows Temu to "gain unrestricted access to a user's phone operating system, including, but not limited to, a user's camera, specific location, contacts, text messages, documents, and other applications."

"Temu is designed to make this expansive access undetected, even by sophisticated users," Griffin's complaint said. "Once installed, Temu can recompile itself and change properties, including overriding the data privacy settings users believe they have in place."

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[–] onlinepersona@programming.dev 8 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (27 children)

So just like the majority of USAian apps out there? I think Temu fits right in. Why are people so concerned about what China is doing with their data, but not the very countries they live in or (more importantly) the dominant online surveillance presence: the USA?

Anti Commercial-AI license

[–] ssm@lemmy.sdf.org 8 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Russian/Chinese software contains spyware: 😡😡👿👿💢💢

US software contains spyware: 😇👉👈

[–] DdCno1@beehaw.org 8 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Unsurprisingly, defenders of dictatorships always have to resort to whataboutism to defend the indefensible.

As per usual, this whataboutism is lazy and inaccurate as well.

[–] JPAKx4@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I mean, I don't like either malware. They are banning tiktok due to security and spying on US citizens, as well as some election interference. These are all things that FAANG can and will do, but since they're American it isn't regulated nearly as much as they should be. All invasions of privacy are bad, it's not whataboutism to call out the holes our regulations have by being overly specific to only "adversarial countries".

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