Phandroid and BGR are reporting that there is a big privacy issue with HTC Sense UI.
According to BGR, the HTC Sense Bookmark Widget takes screen shots not only of the web sites you bookmark, but the ones you don’t! That’s only part of the issue, however. The “scarier” part is that these screen shots are stored as JPG files in a folder on the phone’s internal memory. Further, these files are apparently NOT deleted when the browser is closed, cache is emptied, or even when the phone has a factory reset!!!
In other words, if you were looking at some naughty sites, or, oh, I don’t know, your BANKING, your HTC Sense-enabled phone might have kept JPG images of those sites for someone to find when/if you sell your phone (or have to send it in for fixing or exchange).
From the BGR site:
The problem is these JPEG files are extremely hard to get rid of. They remain when the current browser session is closed, they remain after you clear the browser history, and they remain after a full factory reset. The JPEG files are saved to a folder named .bookmark_thumb1 which is located within the emmc folder of the phones internal storage (so you would expect a full factory reset to delete them). We found some screenshots of us logged into Facebook, logged into our online banking website, and viewing several other mundane websites (see picture above) even after having completed a factory reset.
So what might this mean for Rogers customers forced to install the last HTC E911 Bug-fix on the Magic and Dream? To be honest, I’m not sure yet. I never installed it (my data was cut, and still is) so I fortunately don’t have Sense UI. We will need to check in to this and see if this issue is specific only to some HTC phones, or all HTC phones running HTC Sense.
Aside from the potential privacy issue, it is further aggravating to think that if it is happening on the Magic and Dream (unwittingly, perhaps) Rogers Magic and Dream owners might have have this forced upon them at the risk of losing data. Those who have rooted (and yes, we can do that now, even to the Magic+) or who never updated don’t have to worry (unless running Sense UI).
I will, of course, be posing the questions to @RogersMary, but in the mean time, if you have a Dream of Magic with Sense UI, please have a look for the folder mentioned in the BGR quote and see if those JPGs are there. Let’s hope they’re not.
UPDATE: There seems to be some debate over whether this is in internal memory or on the SD Card. It is also (hopefully!) possible that this only affects some HTC phones with Sense, and not all. If you have a Magic or a Dream with Sense UI, please check and see, and let us know in the comments.
We will keep an eye on the story and update as appropriate.
UPDATE 2: Some important clarifications are necessary to this story, seeing as many people are misunderstanding, as follows:
Internal vs SD debate: The issue was originally noticed on an HTC Incredible, and the story referred to it as being saved on the “internal” memory. Commenters started jumping on the writer, accusing him of not knowing what he was talking about because it is actually being saved to the SD card, and so “of course” it won’t be deleted by a factory reset.
Well, here’s the facts that have been misunderstood. The HTC Incredible comes with RAM/ROM (just like other Android phones) and so most of us are used to calling the ROM the “internal” memory, since it’s the only “internal” memory we have, however the HTC Incredible also comes with 8 GB of flash memory that are NON-REMOVABLE! It is inside the phone and can not be removed. The Incredible also has a microSD slot, so it has ROM, 8GB of Flash memory internally and the option for an extra microSD card added to it. This is what the writer meant by “internal” so it is a semantic misunderstanding.
Non-Bookmarked Sites: People are calling shenanigans and saying that it is only bookmarked sites that are being saved by the widget so that it can fulfill its function. The problem is, lost of users are also saying that there are non-bookmarked sites showing up in this particular folder. Now, either they are all lying, or don’t know what they’re doing. Rather then jump to either of those considerations, maybe we should see if it may be true?
One user commented that he believes it is only happening when you type a URL into the address bar of the stock browser (thus making it part of the history, even though not bookmarked). Since I don’t have Sense UI, I can’t test it, but I’m sure others can. Someone needs to. Simply put, if it’s happening to some people, then it’s happening. Someone who hasn’t seen the behaviour should keep trying to replicate it, or someone should check the phones of those who claims it has happened to see if it’s real.
The Privacy Issue: I see a lot of people saying “Big deal, who cares! It’s just like your browser history on your computer! Delete it manually or it’s your own fault!” Whether or not you don’t care about someone else seeing where you’ve been doesn’t mean that no one else should care. With a web browser you can choose form the menu to delete the cache, however apparently emptying the cache with these phones is not deleting these, because they are not kept in the cache.
As for the argument that people should just delete them manually, it’s easy for us to say that, we are tech-savvy people, we know what we are doing. There are more and more people buying Android phones who are NOT tech savvy. These people don’t read the blogs, and we shouldn’t expect them to either. We can believe that they should, but not expect it, human behaviour being what it is.
If we want Android to truly grow and be popular, it must do so among the “common” user. The people who don’t read the blogs, who just want it to work. These users will not know, nor know how, to find and delete these files manually, and shouldn’t have to. These people might sell their phones, or send them in for repair or exchange, of let friends or family use them, which brings us back to the HTC Incredible. Since that 8GB “internal” flash memory can’t be removed, they can’t take it out before selling or sending in like we can with our microSD’s, so the concern is a valid one.
UPDATE 06/22/10: HTC has admitted to the problem and is working on the fix, but apparently only for the Incredible. They acknowledge that with the Incredible, a factory reset does not remove the images since they are not in ROM, but are on an internal 8GB flash memory chip (and thus can not be removed when selling/trading/exchanging the phone). Some people are reporting that the issue of non-bookmark thumbnails is specific to the Incredible, but HTC doesn’t seem to have mentioned this. Users of the Rogers HTC Magic+ (and the Magic with the Sense UI update) report that it does keep snapshots of bookmarked sites in a folder on the microSD card. So WARNING… if you are going to sell/trade/exchange your Rogers HTC Magic (or Magic+), or send it in for repairs, you should really go in and manually delete those files, or just hold on to the microSD card.
Remember to check out Leave No Droid Behind!