14 DAY TRIAL // While ransomware is mostly found on Windows PCs, malware specifically created for mobile devices has become quite widespread. In fact, the number of infections has grown threefold in the year's first quarter.
According to a new report from Kaspersky Lab, the number of mobile ransom files detected reached 218,625 during the first three months of 2017, compared to 61,832 during 2016's last quarter.
"Ransomware targeting mobile devices soared in first quarter, with new ransomware families and modifications continuing to proliferate. People need to bear in mind that attackers can try to block access to their data not only on a PC but also on their mobile device," said Roman Unucheck, Kaspersky's Senior Malware Analyst.
According to the report, Trojan-Ransom.AndroidOS.Fusob.h remained the most widely used mobile ransomware, with nearly 45% of all attacks being conducted with this piece of code.
Once this Trojan is run, it asks for admin privileges, collects information about the device, such as GPS coordinates and call history, and uploads the data to a malicious server. Depending on the data that it receives, the server may send back a command to block the device.
Additional threats
Kaspersky Lab further detected and repelled 480 million malicious attacks from online resources from over 190 countries, while 80 million unique URLs were recognized as malicious by web antivirus components.
"Attempted infections by malware that aims to steal money via online access to bank accounts were registered on 288,000 user computers," the company said.
Additionally, Kaspersky's mobile security products also detected 1.2 million malicious installation packages and over 32,000 mobile banking trojans.
This is just yet another reminder that security solutions aren't meant just for PCs, but also for mobile devices, especially as the mobile threats continue to grow and multiply. Ransomware has become one of the go-to solutions for cyberattackers, mostly because it's an easy way to make money.