Cyber criminals are targeting Android devices once more to deceive users into divulging personal and financial information. Users are advised to immediately uninstall compromised apps linked to a new scam that involves hackers engaging in advanced advertising fraud. By inundating apps with malicious ads, hackers can disrupt the performance of compromised devices while profiting themselves.
This recent attack, named ‘SlopAds’ by the Satori Threat Intelligence and Research Team, affected 224 Android apps downloaded over 38 million times from the Google Play Store. The team uncovered a sophisticated ad fraud scheme where the threat actors use steganography to hide web navigation to their cashout sites, generating fake ad impressions and clicks. The operation, with an AI theme, includes 224 apps across 228 countries.
Google has removed all problematic apps to prevent new users from falling prey to ad fraud. Users who may have downloaded apps with the SlopsAds bug will receive alerts to delete them. To prevent future attacks, Android users are advised to keep Google’s Play Protect feature active, which detects potentially harmful apps before installation and blocks apps associated with SlopAds behavior.
Ad fraud not only impacts device users but also legitimate advertisers and developers as hackers deceive networks into allowing infected ads. Google warns that ad fraud, a type of invalid traffic, occurs when ads are displayed improperly or when non-human activities generate fake ad traffic, causing harm to advertisers, developers, and users. Android users are urged to promptly remove any flagged infected apps to protect their devices.
