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Analysis reveals 74% of malware attacks target Android

Nokia, that company that once made cellphones and is now more focused on business tech has published its Threat Intelligence Report for the first half of this year.

The contents will have you reaching for your tin-foil hat.

Perhaps the biggest take away from the 21-page report is that cyber criminals are becoming smarter and more devious in their methods.

The smartphone infection rate has ballooned from 0.25% in the first half of 2015 to 0.49% in the first half of this year.

What’s more is that in April this year the infection rate sky-rocketed to 1.06%. This surge in infection rate is thanks in part to the surge in popularity of three types of malware which Nokia has placed at the top of its “Top 20 smartphone malware” list.

The malware top three

Among the top three is Android.Adware.Uapush.A (Uapush), which is an adware Trojan for Android which can send an SMS. It lifts any personal information from the phone.

Then there’s Android.MobileSpyware.Kasandra.B (Kasandra though also known as SandroRat) parades as Kaspersky Mobile Security but in reality its a sneaky Trojan that gives an attacker access to messages, contact lists, call logs, browser history and location data. It compiles all of this in an “adaptive multi-rate file on the SD card” which it can the feed to a command-and-control server.

The final bugger is Android.Trojan.SmsTracker (SMSTracker) which is billed by Nokia as, ” a complete remote phone tracking and monitoring system for Android phones.”

Together these three instances of malware were found in 47.31% of infections. The report also makes mention of the fact that a compromised smartphone can be plugged into a Windows PC and further the reach of the malware.

A rise in rooting

Nokia also revealed that attackers are getting more sophisticated and that more and more malware tries to root a device. The danger with malware rooting itself is that takes complete control of a smartphone and could become extremely difficult to remove.

The problem gets even worse when you look toward the internet of things and see how many of the gadgets in this category use an Android operating system.

Researchers at Trend Micro were able to lock down a smart TV running Android according to Nokia and Andrew “weev” Auernheimer showed how bad security in the IoT universe is by “hacking” a number of internet facing printers earlier this year.

As for staying safe, Nokia has similar advice to ours. Don’t download apps or games from un-trusted websites, i.e. if it isn’t Google Play or the App Store, don’t use it.

Secondly the firm advises using an anti-virus on your smartphone and finally scrutinise app permissions. If Instagram wants to be able to make calls that should raise a red flag and you might have malicious software on your phone.

These should all be pretty obvious by now but as infections seem to be rising we think its worth spreading the word to folks, especially mum and dad.

[Source – Nokia Threat Intelligence Report] [Image – CC BY SA 2.0 Alexandre Dulaunoy]

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