Security researchers at SophosLabs have discovered 15 apps in the Play Store that contain a manipulative strain of adware that hides its own icon in the launcher to avoid being uninstalled by making the process unusually difficult for the users, it disguises itself as a harmless system app. There is a possibility of more such apps being present on the Play Store beside these 15 discovered ones. Some apps of similar nature have gone a step further and were found upon opening the phone’s App Settings page, hidden beneath names and icons that make them appear as legitimate system apps.
Some people tend to download an app, without giving its requirement much of a thought or consideration, the habit may have led you into inadvertently downloading these malicious apps such as QR code reading, free calls and messaging, phone finder, backup utilities and image editor apps which have adware embedded in them and serve no purpose at all other than to generate revenues for the developers by displaying intrusive advertisements. To exemplify, Flash on Calls & Messages – aka Free Calls & Messages is one such app, which shows a fake error message when the user launches it, telling the user that it is incompatible with his device. Then the user is directed to the Google Play Store entry for Google Maps, to mislead the user into believing that the Maps app is the reason for the crash, which is not at all true.
On Google Play Store, most of these camouflaged apps receive negative ratings and reviews which highlight the disappointments and the issues faced by users while using the app. More than 13 lakh phones were populated by t ..
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