MONEY STEALING 'JOKER MALWARE' FOUND IN 24 APPS IN GOOGLE PLAY STORE: BIG THREAT TO ANDROID COMMUNITY

Joker malware found in 24 apps on the Google Play Store has been found to extract money from users by subscribing them to paid subscriptions without their knowledge.

Though the apps have been removed from the Play Store, those who still have these on their devices are recommended to delete as soon as possible. 

What is Joker malware and what does it do?

Joker Trojan steals money from a user’s account by signing them up for premium subscriptions. It starts by silently simulating interaction with an advertisement without the user knowing and then even steals the victim’s SMS messages, which might contain OTP to authenticate payment.

Joker malware: Which apps are affected and in which countries?

Joker malware has infected a total of 24 apps with over 4,72,000 installs, which Google has reportedly removed from the Play Store. The list includes:

• Advocate Wallpaper

• Age Face

• Altar Message

• Antivirus Security- Security Scan

• Beach Camera

• Board Picture Editing

• Certain Wallpaper

• Climate SMS

• Collate Face Scanner

• Cute Camera

• Dazzle Wallpaper

• Declare Wallpaper

• Display Camera

• Great VPN

• Humour Camera

• Ignite Clean

• Leaf Face Scanner

• Mini Camera

• Print Plant Scan

• Rapid Face Scanner

• Reward Clean

• Ruddy SMS

• Soby Camera

• Spark Wallpaper

The Joker malware has targeted a total of 37 countries with a majority in Asia and the EU. In addition to India, the list includes Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, China, Cyprus, Egypt, France, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Honduras, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Kuwait, Malaysia, Myanmar, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Republic of Argentina, Serbia, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom and United States.

Joker malware: How to fix it?

Those who have downloaded any of the apps infected with the Joker malware listed above are recommended to delete them immediately. There is a good chance that the services the malware has signed up a user for will not appear in their Play Store subscriptions. So, to find that out, one will need to carefully sift through their bank account, credit card statement for at least till the month of June to check whether there have been any unwanted transactions without their consent.