170+ Malicious Apps Found On The Google Play Store

If you have been keeping up with the latest happenings, Play Store seems to be plagued by malicious apps. To start with, one of the most popular tools ‘CamScanner‘ was at fault for using an intrusive ad behavior.

Even though they blamed it on their ad provider, it is still not a good sign.

And, a few weeks later, now we have another major report by a Malware Researcher at ESET rounding up about 172 malicious applications in a tweet that were detected in the month of September alone.

It is quite alarming that Google requires third-party researchers to point out the applications that are harmful. The malicious category includes the applications that are infected by adware, subscription scams, hidden ads, SMS premium subscription, and a lot more things.

You can find his overall observation in the image below.

 

Most of the applications that were found to be malicious have been removed as of now. However, it is still not a promising thing to have potential malicious apps on the Google Play Store. Maybe you are safe – but is it worth putting millions of Android users at risk?

If you also take a closer look at the image above, you will observe that the malicious apps had over 335M+ installs combined. It does not sound pretty.

Google may want to think about reducing the number of apps or enforcing strict review guidelines to approve an app on the Play Store. In that way, we can stop worrying about the applications we have on our Android device.

What’s your take on this report? Let us know your thoughts in the comments down below.

Ankush Das
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: google play store, Malware