43 Malicious Apps Detected on Android Smartphones

Accordingly, this research team discovered 43 malicious applications, with 2.5 million downloads and reported this incident to Google Corporation. Google has now removed these malicious applications from the Play Store because they violate Play Store rules.

These malicious apps have been found to be silently running continuous ads, draining battery life, and causing many other issues that affect users.

These apps are mostly in the TV, streaming music, or news categories and are primarily targeted at users in South Korea. However, the same campaign can be used to target Android users in the US, UK, and other countries around the world. They contain adware that runs in the background, constantly tracking information and consuming more battery.

In addition to draining battery, apps that display ads in the background can also eat up mobile data and slow down the user’s phone. If these malicious apps are left running for a long time, it will affect the battery charging and even damage the phone.

According to the study, the adware hidden inside the apps is quite sneaky. It doesn’t attack the device immediately, but instead waits for weeks before it becomes active. This not only helps the malicious apps bypass Google’s security checks, but also allows them to trick users into installing them and get higher ratings on the Play Store. McAfee also found that the operators behind this batch of adware also have the ability to control it remotely.

Unlike malicious apps that infect Android phones with malware, these adware apps display background ads to illegally earn money for their creators and secretly display ads when the phone screen is off.

These software even require users to exclude them from the battery saving feature of the Android platform so that they can run comfortably in the background. Security experts advise that if users have accidentally installed them, they should remove them from their Android devices as soon as possible.

According to McAfee, the solution to knowing whether an Android phone is infected with a virus or not is to check if the battery life is abnormally reduced. At the same time, users should access the battery settings of the Android device, users will find information about the amount of battery consumed by background activities of the applications installed on the device.

How to stay safe from adware applications

Installing new applications on smartphones brings many useful features but doing so can also be dangerous if users do not do due diligence first.

According to security experts, before installing any new app on their Android smartphones, users should first check the app's ratings and reviews on the Play Store. However, since app ratings and reviews can be faked, users should also look for external reviews on other websites.

Video reviews can be really helpful here as users can see the app in question running on someone else's smartphone before deciding to install it on their own phone.

To protect against malware and adware, users should also use one of the best Android antivirus apps. However, if users are on a tight budget, the free Google Play Protect protection feature that comes pre-installed on most Android phones can also scan existing apps and any new apps for malware.

Finally, users need to be careful when apps ask for permission to access certain features of their device. With the adware apps described above, a request to be excluded from Android's power-saving features is a serious warning sign and a sign that something fishy is going on.

This is not always true, as some apps need to use Android features to function. However, an app is more likely to be malicious if it requests permissions that seem unreasonable. Users should consider carefully before granting any additional permissions to an app.

These 43 adware apps have now been taken down from the Play Store but if you have any of them installed on your smartphone, you will have to manually remove them yourself.

Here are 43 malicious apps detected on Android smartphones:

1. best.7080music.com

2. m.gooogoole.com

3. barocom.mgooogl.com

4. newcom.mgooogl.com

5. easydmb.mgooogl.com

6. freekr.mgooogl.com

7. fivedmb.mgooogl.com

8. krlive.mgooogl.com

9. sixdmb.mgooogl.com

10. onairshop.mgooogle.com

11. livedmb.mgooogle.com

12. krbaro.mgooogle.com

13. onairlive.mgooogle.com

14. krdmb.mgooogle.com

15. onairbest.ocooooo.com

16. dmbtv.ocooooo.com

17. ringtones.ocooooo.com

18. onairmedia.ocooooo.com

19. onairnine.ocooooo.com

20. liveplay.oocooooo.com

21. liveplus.oocooooo.com

22. liveonair.oocooooo.com

23. eightonair.oocooooo.com

24. krmedia.oocooooo.com

25. kronair.oocooooo.com

26. newkrbada.ooooccoo.com

27. trot.ooooccoo.com

28. thememusic.ooooccoo.com

29. trot.ooooccoo.com

30. goodkrsea.ooooccoo.com

31. krlive.ooooccoo.com

32. news.ooooccoo.com

33. bestpado.ooooccoo.com

34. krtv.oooocooo.com

35. onairbaro.oooocooo.com

36. barolive.oooocooo.com

37. mppado.oooocooo.com

38. dmblive.oooocooo.com

39. baromedia.oooocooo.com

40. musicbada.oouooo.com

41. barolive.oouooo.com

42. sea.oouooo.com

43. blackmusic.oouooo.com