Baidu apologizes after having cloud users share their internet bandwidth by default

The Chinese search giant says its cloud service employs peer-to-peer delivery to speed up downloads

A Baidu sign at the World Internet Conference in Wuzhen, China, on December 4, 2017. (Picture: Aly Song/Reuters)

Imagine this: You sign up for a cloud storage service thinking you’ll only be using the company’s servers. But then without asking, your provider not only takes up your computer’s storage space, but also uses your internet bandwidth to distribute files.

This is what recently happened to users of Baidu Cloud, or Baidu Wangpan, when users were enrolled in a new incentive program by default. Users say they were offered award points in exchange for the use of up to 1MB/s of their internet upload bandwidth and 5GB of storage space for seven hours a day. Users can disable the function, but only if they go into settings and uncheck the option themselves.

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