Trojan for Smartphones Stole Money From Millions of Users

Staying safe as you’re going online is very difficult these days, as hackers come up with more and more evil ways to steal passwords, credentials, and even money. The simple act of remaining vigilant is perhaps the best way to stay safe – don’t rely too much on software that promises to protect you.

You may have heard about Trojans, as they’ve become incredibly dangerous in recent years. The concept behind them is to mislead people of its true intent.

Watch out for the “GriftHorse” Trojan!

According to TheHackerNews.com, 10 million mobile users from more than 70 countries had to suffer from the Trojan known as “GriftHorse”. The malware was using Android apps to secretly subscribe its victims to premium services. The subscription cost 36 euros.

Aazim Yaswant and Nipun Gupta, both researchers from Zimperium, the company that named the pesky Trojan, released the following statement:

While typical premium service scams take advantage of phishing techniques, this specific global scam has hidden behind malicious Android applications acting as Trojans, allowing it to take advantage of user interactions for increased spread and infection,

These malicious Android applications appear harmless when looking at the store description and requested permissions, but this false sense of confidence changes when users get charged month over month for the premium service they get subscribed to without their knowledge and consent.

The malicious apps belonged to various categories such as Lifestyle, Tools, Dating, Entertainment, and more.

Our publication has written before about dangerous software. We spoke last month about the so-called “Joker” virus that empties back accounts. It was even found in eights apps from the Play Store.

Feel free to tell us about your own experience with malicious apps for smartphones! We hope you didn’t have any, however, but maybe a good written story will help someone avoid cyberthieves.