Google removed these apps from the Play Store, now you should delete them from your phone
Google’s Play Store is a home for millions of apps that make our phones useful in so many ways. And although Google is doing its best to make sure there aren’t any harmful apps on its app market, some inevitably slip through.
Luckily, Google isn’t the only company that’s on the lookout for mischievous apps. Cybersecurity company Evina is also searching and testing apps for any malware that might be lurking inside and recently posted a list of 25 apps that were stealing users’ Facebook credentials. The apps have since been removed from Google’s Play Store, but if you happen to have any on your device, it’s time to delete them.
The list (included below) contains apps with wildly different functionality: from card games to file managers to step counters and even a flashlight app. Combined, they’ve racked up over 2 million downloads and they all contained the same malicious code.
The way the malware works is by waiting for the user to launch an app that’s made by Facebook. Then, it quickly opens a new browser tab with a fake Facebook login page and displays it on top of the app that was initially launched. Users would then put in their Facebook login details and the malware would copy them and send them to its designated server. Obviously, tech-savvy users will likely spot the switcheroo and won’t fall for that trick, but kids or elderly using an Android phone for the first time will easily go along and have their Facebook account compromised.
That’s why it’s important to always make sure the apps you’re installing are legitimate, which can usually be done by looking through the comments to see if there are any warnings about them. That was the case for most of the apps from the list above, but still, the overall rating of the apps was high enough for people to consider downloading them.