Security researchers have discovered 75 applications on Google Play and another ten on Apple’s App Store engaged in ad fraud, according to a report by Bleeping Computer. Collectively, they add to 13 million installations.
Bleeping Computer notes that, apart from flooding mobile users with advertisements, both visible and hidden, the fraudulent apps also generated revenue by impersonating legitimate apps and impressions. What’s more, researchers from HUMAN’s Satori Threat Intelligence team identified a collection of mobile apps that are part of a new ad fraud campaign that they named “Scylla.” The analysts believe Scylla is the third wave of an operation they found in August 2019 and dubbed ‘Poseidon’. The second wave, apparently from the same threat actor, was called ‘Charybdis’ and culminated towards the end of 2020.
HUMAN Security is a company that offers “modern defense to safeguard organizations from bot attacks and fraud.” Read the Bleeping Computer article for a list of some of the fraudulent games.
