Google adds app scanner to make Android phones safer

Google said it would “continually” scan Android devices to catch and remove malicious apps from them.

NEW DELHI: Google on Thursday said that it would "continually" scan Android devices to catch and remove malicious apps from them. In the last few months, Android has been criticized by security researchers for having relatively poor security compared to other mobile operating systems like iOS and Windows Phone. Most of the criticism is targeted at the easy availability of malicious Android apps that can trick users by impersonating valid and popular apps. 

Just days ago a paid anti-virus app was found in the Play store. However, despite its price of nearly $4, the app turned out to be fake and did not offer any security feature to phone. Google later removed the app from the store. 

Currently, all Android phones are set to install apps downloaded from outside the Play store. If users change these settings and install apps using APK files, they have to agree to a pop up telling them that Google will verify the app. 

"Building on Verify Apps, which already protects people when they're installing apps outside of Google Play at the time of installation, we're rolling out a new enhancement which will now continually check devices to make sure that all apps are behaving in a safe manner, even after installation," said Rich Cannings, an Android security engineer. 

"Because potentially harmful applications are very rare, most people will never see a warning or any other indication that they have this additional layer of protection. But we do expect a small number of people to see warnings (which look similar to the existing Verify apps warnings) as a result of this new capability," added Cannings. 

While Android is safer operating system than something like Windows, it is important for users to follow safe practices. Ideally, you should only install apps that come from the Play store. If you have to install an app using APK method - downloading an APK file and then copying it to the phone - make sure that you trust the source from where you are downloading the APK file. In some cases, cyber criminals use modified APK files of popular games and other apps to distribute malware on Android device
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