UC Browser flaw transmits unencrypted user data

A Canadian research group has found that UC Browser, a mobile browser owned by China’s Alibaba Group, has a serious security flaw.

The Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs, in an investigation, found that the browser was sending out data in an unencrypted form, including phone numbers, serial numbers, search queries and geolocation data. Anyone with access to the broadcast can freely view and parse the information.

The Citizen Lab report claims that both the Chinese and the English version of the browser contained the flaw. Alibaba has since commented to various news sources saying they have released a patched version of the browser with the fix, and they don’t believe any user data was stolen.

UC Browser is a third-party mobile browser app with over a 100 million active users.