The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) suspected a Chinese producer of drones DJI in espionage

DJI drones can send critical infrastructure information and US law enforcement information to China.

The US Department of Homeland Security (MIS) suspected one of the largest unmanned aerial vehicle manufacturers, Da-Jiang Innovations (DJI), in sending confidential information about the US infrastructure to China using commercial drones and software.

According to published documents of the World Bank, DJI drones can send data on critical infrastructure and US law enforcement information to China. Representatives of the agency said that the data collected by DJI "with a high probability" can be used by the Chinese government to conduct physical and cyber attacks on the critical infrastructure of the US and citizens of the country.

The documents also indicate objects of interest to the Chinese government, in particular railway systems, water supply systems, storage of hazardous materials, unfinished highways, bridges and railways.

According to the representatives of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which is part of the structure of the IMB, this information was obtained from a reliable source. The problem concerns only unmanned aerial vehicles DJI, used by commercial companies and institutions.

According to the ICE data, DJI drones use two Android-applications - DJI GO and Sky Pixels, that automatically track images and GPS coordinates, access user's phone data and face recognition data even if the device is turned off.

In addition, applications also collect personal user data, including full names, email addresses, phone numbers, credentials, images and videos.

Most of the information collected includes critical infrastructure data, such as detailed images of energy management panels, information on security measures for critical infrastructure facilities, and materials used in bridge construction. Then the collected information is automatically loaded into the DJI cloud storage located in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, it follows from the documents.

Representatives of DJI denied the accusations of the US government, saying that they are based on "knowingly false and misleading information." Users have complete control over what data they will send to the drones manufacturer. The default function of storing custom flight logs can also be disabled, the company explained.