14 DAY TRIAL // There’s an abundance of photography apps in the Play Store, some with really unique features like Prisma, while others share some of the same filters and tools. Every once in a while, an app becomes so popular among users that it even gets media coverage from major news outlets.
One such app is Meitu, developed in China. Meitu’s main feature that makes it stand out from other apps is overly glam filters that can be applied on portrait pictures. They’re quite kitschy if you ask us, with lots of glitter and bright colors, but they do seem to appeal to users, seeing how the app was already downloaded more than 10 million times from the Play store. A kitschy app with common features never hurt anyone, but Meitu might seriously damage the integrity of your personal data.
Twitter user @FourOctets found that the Meitu app might contain some serious vulnerability issues. The app requires permission to no less than nine areas of your phone some of which, like camera and photo gallery, are understandable, while others like phone status and identity, not so much.
23 permissions, data sent to servers based in China
In total, Meitu requests a staggering number of 23 permissions, including MAC address, local IP, exact location, and full network access. When analyzing the app, the Twitter user found MTAnalyticsAdLogEntity.java inside the APK, which contains code for sending details about the phone to analytics. Device model, resolution, Android OS version, MAC address, IMEI and more are all sent to remote servers in China.
It’s also worth mentioning that last year China issued an order requiring app developers in the country to authenticate the identity of their users by tying their online profiles to verified phone numbers or other information that can be used for identification purposes. However, that shouldn’t be applied to users from countries outside China or to photo editing apps.
We advise readers to at least check out the list of permissions before installing the app. In our opinion, Meitu app requires access to far more areas of your phone than it should, seeing how it’s just a photography app.
