Barcode-Scanning App for Android Pushed Malware Onto Millions of Phones

A popular app has been take away from Google Play after it was discovered to have give birth trojanized malware onto millions of users ’ sound via an update .

Until recently , Barcode Scanner was a straight diligence that provided drug user with a basic QR code referee and barcode source , useful for thing like making purchase and redeeming discounts . The app , which has been around since at least 2017 , is owned by developer Lavabird Ldt . , and claims to have over 10 million downloads , the Wayback Machine show .

Researchers with Malwarebytes have control the electronic scanner is the perpetrator , release afresh reportthat show it deliver the advertizement - produce malware onto user ’ sound , probably via a December update . The update muck up the previously benignant app — taking it from “ an innocent electronic scanner to full on malware , ” researchers write .

Photo: Tomohiro Ohsumi (Getty Images)

It is frightening that with one update an app can turn malicious while go under the radio detection and ranging of Google Play Protect . It is baffling to me that an app developer with a popular app would rick it into malware . Was this the strategy all along , to have an app Trygve Halvden Lie inactive , waiting to strike after it reach popularity ? I guess we will never acknowledge .

While Google has yanked Barcode Scanner from its app store , it is not go from touched gimmick . Users of the app will still have to manually uninstall it from their phones .

Barcode Scanner ’s possessor , Lavabird Ltd. , was incorporated in 2020 and is registered at an address in London , according to useable online record book . The troupe ’s director , Dmytro Kizema , reside in Ukraine .

Screenshot: Lucas Ropek: Wayback Machine/Google Play