Strange chinese menu on Lenovo IdeaTab S6000

Question

Context

I just Skyped with my mother (far away) because her Android tablet (Lenovo IdeaTab S6000, running on Android 4.2) showed a strange menu with Chinese characters, almost like a bootloader. My short troubleshoot history looks like this:

• When pressing the volume-keys, the displayed content changed, at one point the text contained "GPS", so I assumed it would be some kind of "hidden troubleshoot menu" for showing system information.
• A restart was possible after pressing and holding the standby-button, after restarting everything seemed untouched.
• Just to make sure, we changed her passwords.
• She did not visit any suspicious websites, nor did she install any apps recently.

With my little knowledge, so far I do not feel able to rule out an attack or a trojan app, from what I can see she could have activated the strange menu by accident. Via internet research I only found one individual with the same problem, but no solution at all.

Question(s)

What can I do to determine the cause? Should I contact the provider/manufacturer? Is it safe to assume that her data & accounts are not compromised?

I know it is little information, so please bare with me, I just want to prevent damage.

Thanks for any advice.

TL;DR

Lenovo IdeaTab showed strange chinese/asian-symbols-menu, gone after reboot, do what now?

Answer 1

What can I do to determine the cause?

The user just accidentally accessed the Factory Mode on Lenovo tablet.

It can be accessed by:

1. Turn off the device
2. Hold "Volume Down", then connect the USB

^{(Image courtesy of XDA)}

As a proof, there is a text containing "GPS" like you mentioned.

For the translation of each menu, you can refer to the post on XDA forum (also, source of this information).

Should I contact the provider/manufacturer?

If the user didn't do anything on this menu, then I believe you don't need to contact the provider/manufacturer since nothing happens.

Is it safe to assume that her data & accounts are not compromised?

I believe no data are compromised. Factory Mode is usually related to device testing/configuration, but not individual user data.

Answer 2

If you Hold power and up it will boot to English