Lookout finds Android crypto mining scams

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Cryptocurrencies, once the exclusive domain of an idealistic fringe movement, have recently become attractive to mainstream retail investors. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the valuation of cryptocurrencies increased exponentially, reaching a market capitalization of over $ 2,000 billion. Cybercriminals are always looking for the path of least resistance to make money and cryptocurrencies are now in their sights.

Lookout Threat Lab security researchers have identified more than 170 Android apps, including 25 on Google Play, scamming those interested in cryptocurrencies. Many of them available globally, these apps advertise themselves as providing cloud-based cryptocurrency mining services for a fee. After analyzing them, we found that no cloud crypto mining actually takes place.

To protect Android users, Google quickly removed these apps from Google Play. Lookout Mobile Endpoint Security and Lookout Personal Digital Safety customers are protected against these threats.

The sole purpose of apps is to steal money from users through legitimate payment processes, but never deliver the service they promise. Based on our analysis, they have scammed over 93,000 people and stolen at least $ 350,000 between users paying for apps and buying bogus upgrades and additional services.1

We have classified these applications into two distinct families which we have named BitScam and CloudScam.

Despite the technical distinction between these two families, all apps use a similar business model, indicating that several criminal actors have created competing companies to target users in the same way.

Most malware executes code that performs clearly malicious activities, such as exfiltrating private information to a command and control server, displaying advertisements outside of the context of the application, or sending premium text messages.

What has allowed the BitScam and CloudScam apps to go unnoticed is that they don’t do anything really malicious. In fact, they hardly do anything at all. These are just typos to collect money for services that don’t exist.

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