Master the art of removing Fake or Rogue Applications: A 4-Step Guide
Rogue Apps might be the fastest-growing phenomenon among cybercriminals. They’re a constant problem in unauthorized and authorized mobile app stores, including Google Play and the App Store. Here’s a wider look at the topic.
What are Fake or Rogue Applications?
Rogue Apps, also called Rogue Mobile Applications, are fake apps that try to look like apps from trusted brands. All kinds of financial institutions now keep an eye out for rogue apps to deal with this serious threat.
This is a new form of digital fraud that is gaining ground in just the past few years. It’s scarily simple to pull off, too. Someone just needs to build a seemingly harmless app, stick your logo on it, and put it up for free. Then, when your customers download it, thinking it’s a fun bonus from your company, you and they both suffer.
For example:
A consumer might download a mobile banking app thinking it was issued by their bank. The rogue apps can contain malware, such as worms, spyware, Trojans, and viruses, used to steal credit card numbers and account usernames and passwords.
What problem do they cause?
Data Theft: Identity theft is selling ill-gotten private data that has practically reached epidemic proportions today. Cyber-criminals are always looking for new ways to snatch info from unsuspecting victims, and your database of customer details is a tempting target. They just need your clientele’s account logins or other authorizations, and it’s not hard to secure those with fake apps bearing your trusted logo.
Brand Impersonation: Criminals pretending to represent your company can use unauthorized apps to communicate with your customers, sending them SMS messages or emails or contacting them via social media to offer fraudulent products and services or solicit sensitive information they can use to operate many other scams. Your company is then left holding the blame for any harm done.
Financial Loss: If your company is running any sort of online transactions through mobile apps, customer credit card numbers, PIN numbers, and similar can be stolen via fake apps masquerading as a legitimate business. Your business could also be exposed to ransomware, with your network encrypted and literally held hostage until you pay a hacker’s demands.
App stores remove rogue mobile apps regularly but new ones commonly bypass approval processes and safeguards. Rogue applications could gain access to a smartphone’s location, contact lists, and photographs. While a bank app is usually free to download, many apps from other industries are not. Rogue applications can be imposters designed to not only steal credit cards and personal information but charge the unsuspecting customer for the phony app. Many smartphones easily can be equipped with malware protection, though too many consumers don’t yet think of using antivirus and antimalware software for their mobile devices.
How to remove rogue apps?
Once you discover rogue mobile apps impersonating you brand, you can take few steps to remove the applications to remove and stop the damage.
Approach A: Removing applications yourself and manually
Goto Mobile Application, Click Report, or visit “Remove content from Google”
Choose “Google Play: Applications”
Report type of infringment
Fill the details
Approach B: Subscribe to Anti-Rogue Service
Also, known as Rogue Application Monitoring and Takedown, strengthens your brand’s cyber resilience by providing a platform where you can find infringing applications and request the removal of rogue applications in one click.
Through anti-rogue services or rogue mobile app protection services, you can get an instant notification as a new impersonation mobile app is discovered. They provide 24X7 monitoring of regular and third-party app stores to identify rogue and malicious apps, try to forge your brand’s identity, and conduct suspicious activities.
Conclusion:
Although this new form of digital fraud is going around and harming tons, there’s always a way to overcome it. But with proper knowledge and use of the software we can devise countermeasures to eliminate means and opportunity as secure configuration review would identify the risks to the network, network resources, and data beforehand and save you from damage and conserve your time
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