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New SMS Trojan Found In Android Markets
Trailrunner7 writes "The Android platform seems to have become the playground of choice for attackers and malware authors looking to make a quick buck. The latest example is a premium-rate SMS Trojan that not only automatically sends costly SMS messages, but also prevents users' carriers from notifying them of the new charges. The new piece of malware, which is known as HippoSMS, has been found in unofficial Android app markets in China. This is just the latest in a series of similar incidents in which attackers and scammers have inserted either outright malicious apps or seemingly benign apps containing malware into app markets. Most of the attacks have targeted Android users, and several times Google has had to remove malicious apps from the official Android market."
Just recently Apple removed from App store a application that did send SMS to spam users.
And I bet there are more, just unnoticed
Posting from my iPhone5
The problem isnt't the right to freely injure yourself, but to be injured by a defective product.
99.99999999999% of consumers cant tell the difference between good software and bad software. The best we can do is judge the supplier as to whether or not it is safe.
Look at windows and viruses. The average person cant tell if that app they just installed had a virus or three with it.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Semi sarcasm....
That's exactly why doctors should not be licensed. Not even educated, if they don't want to be. They put up their sign, and there you have it. If they kill people's children, then after a couple years, those people won't take their children to them any more.
Sarcasm off...
A hackable phone is not freedom. I want the damn thing to work, the concept of a walled garden is actually good in this case. I don't want other people messing with my car, (I'm talkin' to you Onstar) mt refrigerator, or my air conditioner. Oh yeah, or my phone, which is just another appliance.
Interestingly enough, the free market is going to take care of the phones that have the freedom to be hacked so badly. I'm not going to buy one for exactly that reason. Oh the paradox!
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Not that malware hasn't slipped into the Google store before, but the summary seems to indicate that this particular malware is circulating in 3rd party app stores. Something I would wager 99% of users don't even know exist.
I'm one of the 1% that know they exist I guess. However, on android why would you bother with one? It's not like Apple where the iGestapo restrict things that get in the way of iProduct sales.