Baidu browser review, uses, features, advantages and disadvantages

Baidu Browser is a free web browser produced for the Windows and Android platforms, It can transmit the personal user data to Baidu servers without encryption and with easily decryptable encryption, It is the lightest browser on resources for low-end Android and it is vulnerable to arbitrary code execution during software updates via man-in-the-middle attacks.

Baidu Browser 

Baidu consists of two characters, bai (which means 100) and du (degree), The first part (bai) refers to (buy or bye), while the second part (du) refers to (do or dew), The name was inspired by a poem written more than 800 years ago during the Song Dynasty and the Man Behind Baidu is Robin Li.

Baidu browser is one of many superb services offerings from Baidu, one of China’s largest technology companies, that include its search engine, a massive advertising platform, and a Wikipedia-like collaborative encyclopedia.

Baidu Browser is produced and developed by China-based Internet giant Baidu, It is based on Google’s Chromium platform. It has many features beyond those found in standard browsers, such as integrated video & audio downloading tools, a built-in torrent client, and mouse gesture support.

Baidu Browser becomes the most-used search engine in China. Baidu search engine ranks fourth on the Alexa list of most visited websites worldwide, It is the most visited website in China. Installation is relatively simple. Baidu Browser is a safe, reliable & speedy solution, It works very well and fast.

Baidu Browser advantages

Baidu Browser offers many services which range from Baidu Encyclopedia, Baidu Government Information Search, Baidu Games, Baidu Space (the social network), Baidu Patent Search, Baidu Youa (the eCommerce platform), Baidu Yi (the smartphone operating system) and Qunar (the travel booking service), So, It is more than a search Engine.

Baidu Browser can transmit personally identifiable data in Android versions, like the user’s GPS coordinates, the search terms and URLs visited, without encryption, and it can transmit the user’s IMEI and a list of nearby wireless networks with easily decryptable encryption.

Baidu Browser can transmit several personally identifiable data points in the Windows version, such as the user’s search terms, the hard drive serial number model and network MAC address, URL, and title of all web pages visited, and CPU model number, without encryption or with easily decryptable encryption.

Baidu uses Google playbook, the company has been leveraging its search business to move into the other market segments like video, mobile apps and music, Baidu has its browser, It has a superb feature to proxy the requests to certain websites in Windows version and it can permit access to some websites that are normally blocked in China.

Two basic ways of encrypting data by using either the symmetric encryption or asymmetric encryption. The advantage of symmetric encryption is that it is faster than asymmetric encryption. The disadvantage is that with symmetric encryption, when you know the algorithm used to encrypt, you also know how to decrypt anything it encrypts.

With simple algorithms, when encryption uses only symmetric algorithms, someone analyzing a program can write a tool to decrypt anything that the program encrypts by analyzing the algorithms and finding its hard-coded encryption keys (fixed encryption keys that appear inside the program’s code).

The asymmetric algorithms such as RSA were developed to address this weakness, While they are slower than symmetric algorithms, They have the advantage that a different key is used to decrypt data than the one used to encrypt, These keys must be mathematically related, but the algorithms are designed such that it is easy to generate a key pair but computationally intractable to derive the decryption key from the encryption key.

The program can use a hard-coded encryption key, but keep the decryption key a secret by storing it only at the recipient. Although the recipient of the data, using the secret decryption key, will still be able to decrypt the data.

The third party cannot write a tool to do so since the decryption key is not present in the program. Baidu Browser’s encryption is easily decryptable because it is entirely symmetric & it uses hard-coded keys. Their communications encrypted using this method can be easily decrypted.

Baidu can securely send sensitive information over the Internet using a well-known and well-tested protocol utilizing asymmetric cryptography (such as SSL) and not attempt to implement their own home-brew encryption protocols. SSL is a well-analyzed protocol that addresses many security issues not likely to be considered by a nonprofessional cryptographer.

Baidu controls 78.6% of China’s search market, It uses a paid-click model, which has proven to be extremely scalable and profitable, It has 352,000 customers for its advertising business, which seems big, but there are about 40 million businesses in China, So, Baidu still is in the early phases of the market.

Baidu Browser disadvantages

Baidu Browser does not protect software updates with code signatures in Windows and Android versions, so the in-path malicious actor could cause the application to download and execute arbitrary code, representing a significant security risk.

The data of the user is transmitted, in both the Windows and Android versions, unencrypted or with easily decryptable encryption, so any in-path actor could acquire this data by collecting the traffic and performing any necessary decryption.

It manages and transmits user data during its operation, There are security concerns in both Windows and Android versions of the browser that may expose the personal user data, like the user’s geolocation, the hardware identifiers, nearby wireless networks, the web browsing data, and the search terms.

Baidu faces strong rivals like Alibaba and Tencent, Microsoft also is making some inroads in the market, There are many non-wanted programs in Baidu along their products in your PC, You have to get rid of some infamous adwares & toolbars upon installing some Baidu software, It is not bad but it is very hard to do a complete uninstall.

It could be tough to dominate mobile search, as the company does not control the operating system, just like what’s plaguing social stocks like Facebook, shift to mobile will lead to lower revenues, at least in the short-run, It is already slowing, and there are fears that the economy might suffer a hard landing, This would crush Baidu, considering that advertising expenditures are among the first that companies will cut back.

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