Correction: This is just Huawei Ads Kit, which is the equivalent of Google’s AdMob for Huawei devices. It doesn’t necessarily mean there will be system-level ads on EMUI.
Advertisements on Chinese smartphone UI has slowly become ubiquitous and expected, especially in 2019 and 2020. Xiaomi is one of the well-known companies associated with this term from the onset. Recently, Realme, one of BBK Electronics subsidiaries joined the bandwagon. And now, Huawei devices might also soon display ads on its UI, as spotted by MySmartPrice.
The folks at MySmartPrice received an update to one of their Huawei smartphones, which brought Huawei Mobile Services to their device. The terms and conditions of the new update revealed some interesting information, which were earlier announced by Huawei but will now take effect with the update. According to it, the EMUI HMS core will bring along ‘Huawei Ads’ platform to the device, which we think is part of the ‘Ads Kit’, which itself is part of the ‘Huawei Mobile Services’ announced by the company in November.
That means much like Xiaomi and Realme smartphones, Huawei and Honor branded phones will soon display ads on the company’s EMUI Android skin. Some of the key points in the T&C are as listed below.
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- The personal data used for ads personalisation is retained for one year from the time of collection.
- The data is stored in the data centres located in Hong Kong (China) and Singapore.
- If the user gives their consent, Huawei Ads will also collect and process the user’s location information (via GPS) to provide “geographically relevant” advertisements
- In addition, your data may also be processed by our local customer service centres located, for example, in Egypt, Mexico, India, South Korea, and Pakistan, if you are currently residing in any of these countries.
As you can read from the above points, the data collected for personalized ads will be stored by the company for one year in its data centres located in Hong Kong and Singapore. Additionally, it may be processed by the company’s local service centres in regions like Egypt, Mexico, India, South Korea, and Pakistan. The ‘Huawei Ads’ platform will provide ‘geographically relevant’ ads to the users by collecting their location data. Although it might seem concerning, this is what Google and other companies have been doing for a very long time. Anyways, Huawei will offer an option to opt-out of personalized advertisements just like other firms.
That said, the Huawei device which received this update has not displayed any advertisement so far but we are certain this will be in-built in the upcoming Huawei and Honor smartphones going forward.