Google pulls malware-infected apps in its Store, over 3 million users at risk
July 21, 2022
Cyber Security
/ Malware
Google pulled 60 malware-infected apps from its Play Store, installed by more than 3.3 million punters, that can be used for all kinds of criminal activities including credential theft, spying and even stealing money from victims. Zscaler's ThreatLabZ and security researcher Maxime Ingrao from fraud protection firm Evina discovered the downloader apps stuffed with software nasties including Joker, Facestealer, Coper, and Autolycos malware — the latter is a new family, according to Ingrao, who named and discovered Autolycos in eight different apps with more than three million downloads to Android devices. The new malware strain, similar to Joker, steals SMS messages when downloaded and also unwittingly subscribes users to — and charges them for using — premium wireless application protocol services, Ingrao tweeted. Found new family of malware that subscribe to premium services 👀 8 applications since June 2021, 2 apps always in Play Store, +3M installs 💀💀 No webview like #Joke