14 DAY TRIAL // From the beginning of 2016, annoyed Android users started complaining about a SpeedCharge lockscreen taking over their devices and clandestinely showing ads on their lockscreen while the phone was charging.
SuperCharge is a new type of lockscreen wallpaper that became very popular in recent years, first made famous by "battery doctor" type of apps.
A SuperCharge lockscreen, sometimes called BoostCharge, works by showing a clock, the battery level, and the time remaining until the battery is fully charged again.
You can see these types of lockscreen anywhere these days since Android app developers started adding such features to all kinds of apps, not just battery management applications.
SuperCharge lockscreens are a hair's breadth away from being considered adware
Most of these SuperCharge lockscreens are turned on by default, and they don't provide users with the ability to disable such behavior, pushing unwanted features down the users' throats.
The reason behind this is that app developers discovered that they could show a small ad at the top or bottom of the SuperCharge lockscreen, and monetize their app, even at the users' expense.
While this type of behavior is annoying at best, a Reddit user uncovered yesterday that this feature can put your phone's data at risk.
Ads on SuperCharge lockscreens can bypass PINs, fingerprints
If a malicious user woke the device from sleep with a SuperCharge lockscreen enabled, the attacker could press and hold his finger on the ad.
After a certain period of time, the ad would open in a browser, but without asking for a fingerprint or PIN if the device was using one by default.
The attacker would then have free range to access the user's private data and other applications.
User TofuVic compiled a list of apps which load SuperCharge lockscreens and is recommending that users uninstall any app that doesn't allow them to turn off the lockscreen from their settings pages.
The issue is not new by any means, but until now, nobody complained about any PIN or fingerprint bypasses, and only showed their annoyance at having their favorite apps pushing ads and unwanted lockscreens down their throats.