Malware downloaded on to your phone 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.
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.
For years it has been said that Android phones are targeted by scammers more than iPhones, but is it true? It is indeed true, but the reasoning is not as simple. The two primary reasons that scammers target Android phones for their malicious apps is that first, the Android system is an open system and thus more available to scammers to exploit and second, more than 70% of phones in the world are Android based.
TIPS
Android users should use the Google Play Protect option which is on by default. Google Play Protect does a safety check on apps in the Google Play Store before they are downloaded to your device and will remove harmful apps or warn you about questionable apps before they are downloaded.
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. Also look for the number of downloads it has. This can be an indication of the app’s legitimacy. In addition during installation consider what permissions the app requests and be skeptical of apps that ask for unnecessary or excessive permissions that appear to be unrelated to the functioning of the app. For instance, a calculator app doesn’t need to have access to your camera, location, contact list or photos.
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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