SharkBot Trojan Again Infiltrates Google Play Store
Check Point analysts have discovered that SharkBot Android malware has once again made its way into the Google Play Store, masquerading as antivirus apps.
This time, the malware was distributed through three developer accounts (Zbynek Adamcik, Adelmio Pagnotto, and Bingo Like Inc), two of which were active in the fall of 2021.
Let me remind you that SharkBot was previously reported by NCC Group experts. They said that malware usually disguises itself as antiviruses, actually stealing money from users that installed the application. SharkBot, like its counterparts TeaBot, FluBot, and Oscorp (UBEL), belongs to the category of banking Trojans capable of stealing credentials from hacked devices and bypassing multi-factor authentication mechanisms. The malware first appeared on the scene in the fall of 2021.
The NCC Group report emphasized that SharkBot’s hallmark is its ability to perform unauthorized transactions through Automatic Transfer System (ATS) systems, which, for example, distinguishes it from TeaBot, which requires interaction with a live operator for performing malicious actions.
And also, for example, Cleafy and ThreatFabric says, that the Android Trojan SharkBot uses the Accessibility service to steal credentials from banking and cryptocurrency applications in Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Now, Check Point specialists have supplemented the analysis of NCC Group and their colleagues from Cleafy with new data. They write that the malware, again seen in the Google Play Store, does not infect users from China, India, Romania, Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. At the same time, six malicious applications found by researchers were installed more than 15,000 times before being removed, and most of the victims were in Italy and the UK.
They also noticed that SharkBot has a very unusual self-distributing mechanism: it is able to automatically respond to notifications from Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp, distributing malicious links to its fake antivirus applications among the victim’s contacts.
Let me remind you that we also wrote that Newly discovered PhoneSpy Spyware Already Infected Over 1000 Phones.
