There are many applications that we can install on our mobile devices. We have a wide range of options at our disposal and that also means that many of them may not be safe. It is a reality that malware arrives many times when installing a program, and this is something that affects all kinds of systems and devices. In this article we echo a report that many of the applications for mobile devices can have vulnerabilities and be hacked. This means that they can turn against users and, ultimately, affect security and privacy.
Many applications can have hidden vulnerabilities
This study was conducted by a group of security researchers at Ohio University . They have indicated that many applications for mobile devices can have hidden or malicious behavior without users knowing it. Basically it means that they can have certain vulnerabilities that can be exploited by hackers and put security at risk.
They report that in general the applications will respond to our interaction. That is, we are going to write words or phrases, we are going to press certain buttons to carry out a task, etc. Now, this is precisely what can turn against us.
This group of security researchers has analyzed a total of 150,000 applications , of which 100,000 correspond to the most downloaded in Google Play and the rest in other alternative markets. They found that 12,706 of them all, which is roughly 8.5%, contained something that the researchers called “secret back doors.”
Basically it means that those applications had different secret functions that the user does not really know but that at any given moment can turn against him. They can ultimately trigger unknown behaviors.
Integrated master passwords
They also discovered that some applications have built-in “master passwords,” which allow anyone with that password to access the application and the private data it contains.
They also discovered that some of these applications had secret passwords that could activate hidden options, including bypassing payment.
One of the researchers in this study said that any user could be at risk if an intruder discovers these hidden functions and exploits them. In this way, it could carry out different types of attacks that put users’ security and privacy at risk.
Ultimately, this study shows that there are a large number of applications available for mobile phones that may contain hidden functions that are exploited at any given time and affect security. It is therefore very important that we always take into account the importance of downloading from reliable sources and also observe very carefully the privacy policy or the information displayed by a certain software that we are going to install.
Maintaining security and privacy is essential and it does not matter the level we are at or the type of device we use. We leave you an article where we talk about security in Android applications.
Source> Help Net Security
