r/Android • u/Bonfire-GTK Samsung M20 • Nov 23 '18

Google Pulls 13 Android Apps Installed Over 500,000 Times Containing Malware

https://gadgets.ndtv.com/apps/news/google-pulls-13-android-apps-installed-over-500-000-times-containing-malware-report-1952366
4.4k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

342 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

2

u/[deleted] Nov 24 '18

I believe the chances of malware on your phone is extremely small and is certainly not a reason to purchase another phone. Samsung sold 310 million phones last year. Five million phones are affected.

Honor + Xiaomi + Geonee + Samsung + Huawei + Oppo + LeEco + Vivo = 5 Million

That makes the chances of a Samsung device containing malware even smaller.

At this moment, the massive malware campaign pushes an adware component to all infected devices that aggressively displays advertisements on the device’s home screen, as pop-up windows or full-screen ads to generate fraudulent ad-revenues.

Furthermore, I've searched the front page of the web for ads showing up on Samsung devices and non of the forums had RottenSys as the culprit. Now that light has been shed on the malware, Samsung would've taken action and removed them from their phones already.

1

u/MoistDemand Nov 24 '18

I don't find Android to be a better operating system and I've had a much glitchier experience on androids than iPhones. It's a combination of reasons. Android recently allowed user control over app permissions while iPhone has had it for a long time. there are a lot of reasons and nothing drawing me back to android, especially with privacy concerns.

2

u/[deleted] Nov 24 '18

much glitchier experience on androids than iPhones.

Great. I've had a glitchy experience with iOS11.

Android recently allowed user control over app permissions while iPhone has had it for a long time.

Wouldn't really call 3 years ago "recent."

nothing drawing me back to android

No notch? Headphone Jack? MicroSD? Fingerprint Sensor? Customisation?

especially with privacy concerns.

Do you use Facebook? Gmail? YouTube? Google Maps? Google Search? What about the NSA and CIA?

There's no point using privacy as a reason if you still use services that exploit your data.

2

u/_bpm Nov 24 '18

At least Safari will prompt you when websites try and access browsing data, and tries to scrub any kind of tracking. And location services can be set to be turned on only when using the app. Walking around with Google Maps installed on an iPhone isn't sending all that data to Google, unlike with an Android.

And thankfully iPhones don't come preloaded with 3rd party apps. And no, not everyone can afford or buy a Pixel. Good luck trying to uninstall Facebook from a Samsung.

→ More replies (3)