Malware are present more than ever in the Android world. For the first time, the official Android Market has been contaminated with malwares that were repackaged with popular free apps. In the past, Android malware such as Geinimi were found in unofficial app stores, but never in the Android Market.
A total of at least 50 different malware variants were removed from the Android Market by Google as they were in violation with their policies. Furthermore, just like Apple, Google used its kill switch function to remotely remove infected apps from users phones and tablets. As a consequence, the infected devices had their malware removed and it was estimated that between 50,000 to 200,000 android devices had been infected.
The DroidDream as they call it, need the user to launch the infected app in order to work. Once launched, the trojan gather data about the device, including product ID, device type, country and other personal data that it tries to upload to a remote server. It can also install other malware applications without the user knowing it with the potential to create more damage.
Apparently, DroidDream uses known exploits to infect devices and Google has patched these vulnerabilities in its latest Android OS version 2.3 – Gingerbread. However, this requires the user to update its device to the latest OS; how many users would even install an anti-virus on a phone to protect it? Let alone updating its smartphone OS? Unfortunately, a very small percentage, so the DroidDream threat is still present for the moment.
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