This year, more and more individuals around the world are taking a keen interest in cryptocurrency investment, more so after Bitcoin’s exponential growth, drop and growth once again.
Reuters
Also Read: India Ranks Second In Crypto Adoption Globally
And this craze has also been noticed by scammers and cyberattackers, and they’ve been duping users in the form of malware and adware infested apps spread across the Google Play Store.
However, Google has finally taken notice. It has gone ahead and banned around eight extremely popular and harmful apps that in case you’ve downloaded, must delete right now.
The apps were revealed upon analysis by Trend Micro that found that these malicious apps were fooling its victims into watching ads, paying for subscription services with monthly fees of around $15 as well as paying for increased mining capabilities without really getting anything in return.
Trend Micro flagged these malicious apps on Google Play Store and asked Google to pull them down.
Also Read: Ether vs Bitcoin: Analysing The Crypto Market For An Indian Investor
The eight harmful ‘fake’ crypto apps include:
BitFundsBitcoin MinerBitcoin (BTC)Crypto HolicDaily Bitcoin RewardsBitcoin 2021MineBit ProEthereum (ETH)
In case you have any of these apps installed on the phone, it is strongly recommended that you uninstall them. According to Trend Micro, Crypto Holic and Daily Bitcoin Rewards were paid apps charging users $12.99 and $5.99 respectively.
Reuters
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And while these malicious apps have been taken down, Trend Micro highlights that there are more than 120 fake apps like these that promise to offer mining capabilities even though they don’t, and just fool users into watching in-app ads, affecting over 4,500 users globally from July 2020 to July 2021.
Do you invest in cryptocurrency? What has been your experience like? Tell us in the comments below. For more cryptocurrency updates and tech news, keep visiting universo virtual.com.