SwiftKey leaks users’ phone numbers and email addresses
There are many of us who use SwiftKey, the well-known virtual keyboard available for Android and iOS devices - and now the app is suffering from the suspension of a key component due to the fact that it was found leaking users’ private information; phone numbers and email addresses to be exact.
A number of SwiftKey users have reported to find many people’s phone numbers and email addresses in their suggestions, according to The Telegraph. A Reddit user stated that he saw German-language suggestions and email addresses on a newly-rooted Samsung Galaxy S6 smartphone, featuring the UK English pack installed.
Microsoft's SwiftKey believes that this issue has been caused by a bug in the keyboard’s synchronisation element - which is essentially utilised to maintain a user's data updated between different devices. As a result, the app's feature has been cut off.
Below are two examples of users complaining about the issue on Twitter:
The Next Web got in touch with SwiftKey, and the company responded stating:
“This week, a few of our customers noticed unexpected predictions where unfamiliar terms, and in some rare cases emails, appeared when using their mobile phone. We are working quickly to resolve this inconvenience.
While this did not pose a security issue for our customers, we have turned off the cloud sync service and are updating our applications to remove email address predictions. During this time, it will not be possible to back up your SwiftKey language model.
The vast majority of SwiftKey users are not affected by this issue. If you have any reason to believe you are seeing unfamiliar predictions, please contactreviews@swiftkey.com.”
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Via: | The Next Web |
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Image Credit: | MS Power User |
