McAfee’s Boffin Identified 38 Android apps Unabashedly tearing up the ever-popular gaming sensation on the Google Play Store Mine Craftbut actually secretly designed to generate advertising revenue.
The app, which McAfee detects as Android/HiddenAds.BJL, loaded ads in the background without the user’s knowledge and is estimated to have been downloaded approximately 35 million times on Android devices.
Since the game was downloaded from the official Google Play app store, users who are most likely young children, a typical Minecraft demographic, should ensure that the app is properly vetted for inappropriate behavior. You may assume that
sign up for newsletterSecurity news, advice and tips.
Ads are not displayed during gameplay, but they are downloaded in the background and eat up resources such as bandwidth, battery, and CPU cycles.
McAfee experts shared a list of apps they discovered. The most popular app among them (Block Box Master Diamond) alone he achieved 10 million downloads.
- block box master diamond
- block box skyland sword
- block boy earth mini
- block city dragon sun
- block city fun diamond
- Block Crazy Builder City
- block diamond boy pro
- block earth skyland world
- block forest tree crazy
- Block Fun Rainbow Builder
- Block Game Skyland Forest
- blocky loki monster builder
- Block Lucky Master Earth
- block monster diamond dragon
- block pixel art tree pro
- Block Pro Forest Diamond
- block rainbow monster castle
- block rainbow sword dragon
- block world tree monster
- craft boy clever sun
- craft castle sun rain
- craft city loki rainbow
- craft clever monster castle
- craft dragon diamond robo
- Kraft Forest Mini Fun
- craft game earth world
- Build Loki’s Forest Monster
- craft lucky castle builder
- craft mini lucky fan
- craft monster crazy sword
- craft rainbow mini builder
- Craft Rainbow Pro Rain
- craft sword city pro
- craft sword mini fan
- Craft Sword Vip Pixel Art
- Craft World Fun Robo
- Craftsman: Building City 2022
- Lokicraft: Forest Survival 3D
McAfee researchers contacted Google Play, which removed the offending app from its store. But given that we had to notify Google about these apps, we have to wonder how many other similar apps that violate Android app store rules go unnoticed.
Did you find this article interesting? Follow Graham Cluley on Twitter again Mastodon To read more about the exclusive content we post.
