OnePlus’s new OxygenOS Open Beta adds a bloatware which shares sensitive information with Tencent

Before the launch of the OnePlus 7 Pro and OnePlus 7 scheduled for May 14, the company has come to light once again, and this time for all the wrong reasons. The company had rolled out its OxygenOS Open Beta Software update for the OnePlus 6 and the OnePlus 6T devices earlier. And the users of the devices have found something which could land OnePlus in trouble. In the new beta update, the company has added an Intelligent Cleanup feature with the intention of freeing up the storage on the OnePlus 6 and the OnePlus 6T devices. The Intelligent Cleanup feature is present in the preinstalled File Manager application of the device. Besides cleaning up the phone, the app is also sending data to the company who made the application – Tencent. This is obviously very worrisome for the users.

The users noticed that the Intelligent Cleanup tool was a tool made by Tencent. And as per the reports shared by the users on the official OnePlus forum, they are concerned about their data being with Tencent. And it is opposite of the OnePlus’ claim of it being against bloatware. OnePlus had added the Intelligent Cleanup feature for its File Manager app in the OxygenOS Open Beta 17 for the OnePlus 6 and in OxygenOS Open Beta 9 for the OnePlus 6T. In the changelog of the update, this feature is already listed as Clean in the application and it uses a tool developed by Tencent and OnePlus. A user had also pointed out that the updated privacy for File Manager states that relevant data is sent to Tencent’s Singapore server.

It is true that some of the information might be sent to Tencent server such as the Android version, language, region, and hardware model. But it is the other information that is being shared about which the users are worried. Information such as application caching details and app usage details are more sensitive and is found problematic by the users. Some users on Reddit have also reported the same issue about their data being shared with Tencent. However, it should be noted that the feature is currently limited only to India. And there is no word from OnePlus about its expansion of this feature to the other markets.

As mentioned earlier, OnePlus is against the addition of unnecessary bloatware to its devices. We hope that OnePlus will soon fix this or give out a statement about what information is being shared so that its users can be at peace.