Woburn, MA – May 15, 2014 - Kaspersky Lab recently discovered two fake antivirus applications imitating the Company’s products in two different official app stores for mobile devices.
The first fake app was discovered in Windows Phone Store. This in itself was unusual because scammers tend to target users of Android – via Google Play – due to the platform’s popularity. The app in question went by the name of Kaspersky Mobile. The fact there is no such program in Kaspersky Lab’s product line suggests the fraudsters didn’t expect anyone to notice the discrepancy. Another interesting feature of this particular app was the fact that users had to pay for it. This meant its creators immediately started making money without having to devise additional scams.
The second fake app imitating the Kaspersky Lab brand was for sale in Google Play and was called Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2014. There is no Kaspersky Lab product for mobile devices with that name. The screenshot used on the Web page of the fake app was a copy from the official Kaspersky Internet Security for Android Web page. Unlike the first fake app for sale in Windows Phone Store, the creators of this fake app didn’t add a simulation of a scanner – the functionality was limited to random series of statements appearing on top of an “official” logo.
Quote
Roman Unuchek, Senior Malware Analyst
Kaspersky Lab
“The story of paid fake AV for mobiles started with the appearance of Virus Shield in the Google Play store. Now we are seeing how one successful scam spawns numerous clones. Scammers who want to make a quick buck from inattentive users are selling dozens of fake apps, copying the design, but not the functionality of the original. It is quite possible that more and more of these fake apps will start appearing. One thing is for sure, the security mechanisms put in place by the official stores cannot cope with these kinds of scams.”
More information can be found on Securelist: http://www.securelist.com/en/blog/8221/Fake_antivirus_attack_of_the_clones
About Kaspersky Lab
Kaspersky Lab is the world’s largest privately held vendor of endpoint protection solutions. The company is ranked among the world’s top four vendors of security solutions for endpoint users*. Throughout its more than 16-year history Kaspersky Lab has remained an innovator in IT security and provides effective digital security solutions for large enterprises, SMBs and consumers. Kaspersky Lab, with its holding company registered in the United Kingdom, currently operates in almost 200 countries and territories across the globe, providing protection for over 300 million users worldwide. Learn more at www.kaspersky.com.
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Media Contact
Sarah Bergeron
781.503.2615
sarah.bergeron@kaspersky.com
* The company was rated fourth in the IDC rating Worldwide Endpoint Security Revenue by Vendor, 2012. The rating was published in the IDC report "Worldwide Endpoint Security 2013–2017 Forecast and 2012 Vendor Shares (IDC #242618, August 2013). The report ranked software vendors according to earnings from sales of endpoint security solutions in 2012.
