More than 1,000 Android phones found infected by creepy new spyware

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More than 1,000 Android users have been infected with newly discovered malware that surreptitiously records audio and video in real time, downloads files, and performs a variety of other creepy surveillance activities.

In all, researchers uncovered 23 apps that covertly installed spyware that researchers from security firm Zimperium are calling PhoneSpy. The malware offers a full-featured array of capabilities that, besides eavesdropping and document theft, also includes transmitting GPS location data, modifying Wi-Fi connections, and performing overlay attacks for harvesting passwords to Facebook, Instagram, Google, and the Kakao Talk messaging application.

“These malicious Android apps are designed to run silently in the background, constantly spying on their victims without raising any suspicion,” Zimperium researcher Aazim Yaswant wrote. “We believe the malicious actors responsible for PhoneSpy have gathered significant amounts of personal and corporate information on their victims, including private communications and photos.”

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