It’s recently come to light that 10 million Android phones might have been infected with a piece of malware called HummingBad which can take root in your phone, collect your personal data and making it act like you’ve clicked on ads that you haven’t. That’s not good. But it’s far from the only bad actor out there. So the question is, how do you find out if you’re infected by something. Then how do you protect yourself.
First, let’s talk about detection. You have to run an anti-virus app on your phone to detect HummingBad or any other nasty piece of malware. My suggestion would be to use something from a reputable AV company such as the following:
Any of these will find the sort of stuff that can make your life miserable and kill it. But in the event that whatever anti-virus app can’t kill whatever it finds, your only course of action is to backup your contacts and data and reset your phone. Not ideal, but it is effective.
Now, over to how to protect yourself. And I will say up front that some of you won’t like these suggestions. The main way that malware gets onto Android phones is when you get your apps from outside the Google Play Store. That’s not to say that it isn’t possible to get an infected app from the Google Play Store. But it’s far less likely to happen vs just getting an app from anywhere on the Internet. Thus if you are the type to grab apps from anywhere, don’t. Simply making that one change improves the odds that you will not be infected by anything. Another way to protect yourself is not to “root” the device as it not only opens you up to security risks, but likely voids the warranty of your phone too. Not good on either front. And quite frankly it’s not worth the risk. Thus to keep yourself safe, don’t do it.
Are there any other suggestions that you can think of? If there are, please leave a comment and share your thoughts.
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This entry was posted on July 7, 2016 at 8:52 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Android. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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Your Android Phone Might Be Infected With Malware…. Here’s How To Check
It’s recently come to light that 10 million Android phones might have been infected with a piece of malware called HummingBad which can take root in your phone, collect your personal data and making it act like you’ve clicked on ads that you haven’t. That’s not good. But it’s far from the only bad actor out there. So the question is, how do you find out if you’re infected by something. Then how do you protect yourself.
First, let’s talk about detection. You have to run an anti-virus app on your phone to detect HummingBad or any other nasty piece of malware. My suggestion would be to use something from a reputable AV company such as the following:
Any of these will find the sort of stuff that can make your life miserable and kill it. But in the event that whatever anti-virus app can’t kill whatever it finds, your only course of action is to backup your contacts and data and reset your phone. Not ideal, but it is effective.
Now, over to how to protect yourself. And I will say up front that some of you won’t like these suggestions. The main way that malware gets onto Android phones is when you get your apps from outside the Google Play Store. That’s not to say that it isn’t possible to get an infected app from the Google Play Store. But it’s far less likely to happen vs just getting an app from anywhere on the Internet. Thus if you are the type to grab apps from anywhere, don’t. Simply making that one change improves the odds that you will not be infected by anything. Another way to protect yourself is not to “root” the device as it not only opens you up to security risks, but likely voids the warranty of your phone too. Not good on either front. And quite frankly it’s not worth the risk. Thus to keep yourself safe, don’t do it.
Are there any other suggestions that you can think of? If there are, please leave a comment and share your thoughts.
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This entry was posted on July 7, 2016 at 8:52 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Android. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.