Malware downloaded on to your phone, computer or tablet can cause you many problems including making you a victim of identity theft, stealing your bank account or other assets or making you a victim of a wide variety of scams.  The two most common ways that malware is downloaded on to your devices is through clicking on malware infected links or downloads contained in emails or text message along with downloading malware infected apps.

As I often advise you, never click on a link or download an attachment to an email or text message unless have absolutely confirmed that the link or attachment is legitimate.

But what about apps.

The first rule in avoiding malware infected apps is to only get your apps from the Google and Apple official app stores.  Both of these do their best to weed out malicious apps.  Last year Apple reported that it rejected 1.7 million app submissions and Google indicated that it banned 173,000 developer accounts from Google Play.  However, catching malicious apps is like a game of whack-a-mole.  As soon as you stop one malicious app, another pops up.  In the past clever scammers would submit apps without malware that they then would update with malware later after the app had already been vetted by Apple or Google.

TIPS

Along with only getting your apps from the official App Store and Google Play, you should also carefully read reviews of the apps, but even there you need to be a bit skeptical because scammers often will submit phony positive reviews..

Install security software on all of your devices and, most importantly, install security updates as soon as they are available.  Also, whenever you download a new app run a security scan to specifically look for malicious code.

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