Beware! Fake Chinese Android smartphones come preloaded with malware

The Android platform is no stranger to malware, in fact in the first three months of this year over four lakh malwares were detected on Google’s operating system. The battle with malwares though has taken a new twist, with German publication Heise claiming (via PhoneArena) that certain Chinese smartphone makers are shipping smartphones with built-in malware.

A smartphone called Star N9500, which looks deceptively like Samsung’s Galaxy S4, is being shipped with a dangerous malware called Uupay.D bundled. The Trojan essentially collects the user’s personal information and sometimes also turns on the phone’s mic to listen to conversations taking place near the smartphone. It can also send SMS to premium services without the user’s knowledge.

The Star N9500 is available at an affordable $217 (Rs 13,000 approximately) in China, which has extended its reach. Surprisingly, the company has acknowledged the presence of the Trojan in the phone. But it claims that the malware is a part of the firmware, which makes it really difficult to remove.

Source: BGR