Report: 99 Percent of New Mobile Threats Target Android

MojoKid writes: "Google's open source Android platform has the distinction of being the most popular mobile operating system in the world. That's great in terms of dominating the market and reaping the rewards that come with it, but it's also for that very reason that Android finds itself the target of virtually every new mobile malware threat that emerges. According to data published in F-Secure's latest Mobile Threat Report (PDF), over 99 percent of the new mobile threats it discovered in the first quarter of 2014 targeted Android users. To be fair, we're not taking about hundreds of thousands, tens of thousands, or thousands of malware threats — F-Secure detected 277 new threat families, of which 275 honed in on Android."

Comments

Market Share

[presspass]

When Apple gets the market share that Android has, you'll see that Apple gets as many attacks as Android does.

Re:Market Share

[BasilBrush]

Of course Apple used to be the market share leader. But Android also had most malware back then too.

It has nothing to do with market share. It's about security. The difference is a single curated market for Apple, vs multiple markets and no curation for Android.

Re:Market Share

[Anubis IV]

I keep seeing this line trotted out, but it only serves to distract from the real issue.

What I've seen time and again from these reports over the last year is that it isn't about Android vs. iOS: it's about app stores. The Google Play store, for instance, has been the source of very few malware incidents (i.e. something like 2-3% of the total). Most of the malware hitting Android is coming from third-party stores that are of questionable trustworthiness. As always, users should be advised to only install software from sources they trust. If iOS allowed users to install from third-party stores without jailbreaking, we'd be seeing the same problems on iOS, regardless of their current marketshare or lack thereof (besides which, marketshare is a measure that shouldn't be used in isolation when assessing the worth of a platform's users to developers, including malware developers).

So, please, stop painting this as an iOS vs. Android thing. Regardless of platform, the users being affected by this stuff, in general, are those grabbing apps from untrustworthy sources. Focus your attention there.

Re:Market Share

[jo_ham]

no curation for Android

Untrue. By default you have Play, Google's curated app store. You can install other app stores or side load, but the default is just Play.

With great power comes great responsibility and all that. Besides which Apple's App Store isn't devoid of malware either, it's just a different kind of malware. My girlfriend is Chinese and there are a lot of Chinese apps, presumably not even visible in the western version of the store, that look extremely iffy. They ask you for random personal details, direct you to nasty looking web sites, and have masses of rip-off in-app purchases and pay-to-win scenarios.

You realise if an Apple user tried to spin that line in a story where 99% of malware was targeted at iOS they would be down modded into the ground, right?

"Here's tangible, documented proof of 99% of malware being on Android, but hey, some Chinese apps on iOS 'look a bit suspicious' so Apple is bad too!"

Laughable. Truly laughable.

Re:They are not much different

[MatthiasF]

Not even close.

Try 78% and 15%, in favor of Android.

http://www.engadget.com/2014/0...

Re:secure from what?

[Penguinisto]

fwiw, the NSA has owned all platforms, so it's not like iOS is invincible.

I strongly suspect that it has less to do with any flaws in either OS, than it does in the fact that iPhones get regular updates/patches/etc, whereas the vast majority of Android phones do not.

This is the one thing that Apple really should get props for - they go out of their way to ensure that, within reason, older iPhones get patched/updated along with the newest ones. Meanwhile, all but a relatively tiny fraction of (global) Android users buy models where neither carrier or manufacturer really give a damn if the phones they sell ever see a patch. I mean, seriously - the cheap/low-end Android phones can still be found coming out brand new with 2.2/2.3 installed on the damned things.

Until that paradigm changes, the massive majority of malware and hacks will target the obviously juicy (and mostly obsolete and/or unpatched) Android market.

Re:secure from what?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is probably worse for iOS than being insecure.

Their marketshare has fallen so far it's not worth targeting them any more.

Speaking as an iOS user, I'm perfectly fine with you Android users getting all of the malware love. No really... you can keep all of it... I don't want any!