Huawei ditches unwanted lock screen ads

[mongeese]

Why it matters: As soon as Huawei’s default wallpapers began switching to advertisements for Booking.com last week, the mobile manufacturer played a quick game of who’s to blame. Huawei claimed it wasn’t them, Honor backed them up and blamed the Booking.com app, but it wasn’t on every device. While we still don’t know the exact cause of the issue, Huawei has confirmed it did come from their servers, but thankfully, it won’t be distributed to any more devices.

According to a statement via Techradar, someone slipped the images into Huawei’s rotating wallpaper servers, which began to send them out. Wallpapers should automatically be changed to something other than an ad soon, but to remove the ads from the device they’ll need to be deleted manually.

“Dear users, we thank you for your candid comments, we are sorry for the inconvenience caused to your experience. Please kindly be informed that we have taken down those lock-screen images from our servers, as they should not be appearing on lock-screen interfaces.

For the image/s already downloaded to your phone, you may delete as per following: 1) When the image appears on the screen, slide up from the bottom edge of the screen, and the operation toolbar appears; 2) Click the "Delete" button and click "Remove" in the confirmation box which pops up.

We will continue to improve our services and bring you an excellent user experience.”

While the problem seems to be over, the impact could be felt for a while. There are three ways to view what happened: Huawei knew about the advertisements and used them as a cash grab, Huawei’s servers are woefully insecure, or Huawei employees with access to the servers can’t be trusted. None of them look particularly good, and Huawei had better do something to regain users’ trust or their customers will evaporate.

Image Credit: Tinh Khuong on Unsplash

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https://www.techspot.com/news/80532-huawei-ditches-unwanted-lock-screen-ads.html

 

[shamus087]

This stuff is really bad news. All of it. I have a Huawei mate 9. The phone is my favorite phone I've ever used. Its been consistently reliable for 2 year and have had no issues that were not my causing. This phone has performed so well that I was certain that my next phone would be another newer phone. With all the recent news it seems the decision was made for me and I'm not happy about it.

 

[Lew Zealand]

You know you screwed up extra-bad when your business decisions make it look like the US government actually did something *right* by banning you.

 

[Nobina]

Now all that money they made with those ads will be gone and then some. I sure as **** ain't getting a Huawei phone...probably ever.

 

[p51d007]

This stuff is really bad news. All of it. I have a Huawei mate 9. The phone is my favorite phone I've ever used. Its been consistently reliable for 2 year and have had no issues that were not my causing. This phone has performed so well that I was certain that my next phone would be another newer phone. With all the recent news it seems the decision was made for me and I'm not happy about it.

I had 3 over the years. Never heard of Huawei, till I stumbled onto them, on an XDA user forums, while waiting for the "invite" to get an original OnePlus One. Was STUNNED how responsive a Snapdragon 400 chip was, how bloat free it was. When the OnePlus arrived, I shelved it and kept the Mate2. Then I got the Mate 8 & Mate 9. Never had an issue with any of them, very responsive, good camera, great display. Just no updates... Now that the USA tossed Huawei out, for better or worse, I had to move elsewhere because updates stopped coming. I just don't jack with a phone anymore...tweaking, flashing, not to mention that Huawei doesn't issue unlock codes for the bootloader anymore.
Shame...good phone. As for the spying problem, heck, they all spy in one way or another.

 

[Uncle Al]

ROFLMAO! Nothing worse that being caught red handed! Just hope the US sticks to it's' guns and keeps these guys blacklisted .....

 

[QuantumPhysics]

Is 2019 the year of the "squared" camera placement on back of smartphones???

I truly don't need more than 3 damn cameras.

 

[EClyde]

This stuff is really bad news. All of it. I have a Huawei mate 9. The phone is my favorite phone I've ever used. Its been consistently reliable for 2 year and have had no issues that were not my causing. This phone has performed so well that I was certain that my next phone would be another newer phone. With all the recent news it seems the decision was made for me and I'm not happy about it.

bummer man, if your phone elicits this then your horizons need broadening. Buy a tent...I know you have two

 

[Eldritch]

Huwaei phones are notorious for breakdowns when stressed. Have seen this myself.
Someone in my family decided to install Google Photos and their photos began to sync with Google. It took around 5 hours to sync all photos and videos.
Result : The damn antenna got damaged or something and voice calls became incoherent. It seems they didn't provide for proper cooling or used inferior materials/parts. After that it was basically junk and no more Huwaei for us.

 

[Markoni35]

Maybe they were hacked.

 

[shamus087]

bummer man, if your phone elicits this then your horizons need broadening. Buy a tent...I know you have two

Unfortunately (fortunately?) I have to use a phone everyday for work and to keep in touch with family. I just want it to work. Most other phones just overheat or throttle down. This phone just keeps chugging. At least until this recent stuff going on, its seemed a bit more sluggish recently. Everything on this phone just seems to work. All the camera functions and all the gps, Bluetooth, wifi, powersave, it all functions with with pretty much no hassle. With my Samsung I always had issues with wifi, with my HTC Bluetooth/camera. For me less time spent on the phone at work means more time spent with my family. And having functions fail like gps and Bluetooth can make a day much longer.