Required App Raises Fears China Will Track Sensitive Data During Olympics
American 2018 Olympic silver medalist Chris Mazdzer is worried about being hacked as he heads into the Beijing Winter Olympics next month. Like everyone there, he's required to use China's My 2022 health-monitoring app despite fears about encryption problems.
"It's very possible there's apps on my phone where I'm sure there's ways to hack in there," the luger told VOA. "I feel that I have nothing to hide or worry about on my phone, so I'm kind of blissfully going into this kind of just like, 'All right, I have to download this in order to compete.'"
My 2022 uses voice audio and file transfer encryption that "can be trivially sidestepped," according to the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab website. Encryption normally protects data, such as passwords, sent in transit and can prevent outsiders from hacking into an account holder's data.
As host of the February 4-20 Winter Games, Beijing expects about 2,800 athletes plus their delegations and a small group of spectators to converge in a COVID-19-free Olympic bubble.
The app collects sensitive medical information, but it's not clear who can see it, according to The Citizen Lab, which studies internet security. Health customs forms, which include passport details, demographic data, and medical and travel history, are also vulnerable. Server responses can also be "spoofed"
