14 DAY TRIAL // In the first quarter of 2015, cybercriminals increased their efforts to create malware for the Android mobile platform to a degree that a new threat was recorded every 17 seconds by a security company.
Cybercriminals have adapted to the trends of the market and channeled their efforts into producing malware that can impact on as many users as possible.
About 4,900 new threats pop up every day
Android has become the most popular operating system in the mobile world, with reports saying that almost 61% of the users worldwide relied on an Android device to connect to the Internet.
According to information gathered by security company G DATA, in the first quarter of 2015, there were 440,267 new malware samples designed for Google’s mobile platform, which translates into an avalanche of about 4,900 new threats emerging on a daily basis.
Breaking down the numbers even further, this means that, in Q1 of this year, a new malware piece became available every 17.6 seconds.
The figures represent a 6.4% increase compared to the previous quarter, and a rise of 21% compared to the first quarter of 2014.
Most of the malware has financial motivation
As per G DATA’s analysis, a little over half (50.3%) of the new threats recorded in the studied period of 2015 were financially motivated, such as banking and SMS Trojans. However, the number is likely higher, as these are only the pieces that have been determined to have a direct financial purpose.
“Counting unknown cases, the number could be even higher, as the experts have only studied malware with a direct financial purpose. If a malware program subsequently installs apps or steals credit card data as an additional process after a payment has been made, the malware does not appear as financially motivated in these statistics,” the report from G DATA says.
Among the Trojans of this kind, the researchers highlight Svpeng, which also comes with ransomware functionality, and Faketoken, whose purpose is to steal mobile transaction authentication numbers.
