Koo app, the Indian alternative of Twitter has been accused of exposing personal data of its users by French security researcher Robert Baptiste which goes by the name Elliot Alderson on Twitter. The hacker tweeted that he spent 30 minutes on Koo at the request of users on Twitter and found that Koo was exposing sensitive information of its users including email address, names, gender and more. Koo, Twitter's new Indian rival gained popularity after Twitter denied to ban some accounts as requested by the Indian government that were tweeting about the ongoing farmers' protests. Koo, The Indian Home Grown Social Media App Has Chinese Roots; Co-Founder Aprameya Assures Chinese Investors Shunwei Will Exit Fully.

Robert Baptiste also shared some screenshots and revealed that it was an easy job for him to get the personal information of Koo users. In addition to email address, name, gender, the app also leaked the date of birth and marital status. The hackers also suggested that Koo had a domain registered in the US with registrant based in China.

Koo app co-founder and CEO, Aprameya R, noted the issue and replied that the app is fully secured and the aforementioned data is publicly available, as users have chosen to do so on Koo.

He Tweeted, "Some news about data leaking being spoken about unnecessarily. Please read this: The data visible is something that the user has voluntarily shown on their profile of Koo. It cannot be termed a data leak. If you visit a user profile you can see it anyway".

Baptiste then shared another screenshot of an IAS officer on Koo and stated that the person has nowhere mentioned her marital status, gender and DOB on the app but he has all this information.

To that, Aprameya replied, "We're attempting to do something for our country, India. All help is appreciated. If you want to help out in this journey of ours please write to me at ar@kooapp.com and we can take a look at all the feedback you have. Thanks!"

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Feb 11, 2021 04:33 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).