Cybercriminals took advantage of the rage for the series The Squid Game and used an app to infect thousands of cell phones with a Trojan

Twitter user @ReBensk was the one who gave the official alert, on October 18, that the app for Android systems Squid Game Wallpaper 4K HD, which was in Google Play, downloaded a malware of the Joker Trojan type on the devices of the victims.

This information was confirmed by Lukas Stefanko, a researcher at the cybersecurity company ESET. The application promised a large collection of wallpapers about the popular Netflix series The Squid Game.

Although the application has already been removed by Google from the official Android app repository, prior to its removal had more than 5,000 downloads.

According to Stefanko, downloading this Trojan will likely result in subscription to premium SMS services or the deployment of malicious and / or fraudulent advertising on the victim’s phone.

In addition, it warns that there are another 200 unofficial apps available on Google Play related to The Squid Game, and the one with the most downloads has more than a million installations in just 10 days.

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“It seems like a great opportunity to make money with in-app ads for one of the most popular TV shows without an official game. The most downloaded of them reached one million installs in 10 days. This game is not so well managed ”, he adds.

A similar scenario occurred with popular video games and applications such as Pokémon Go, Fortnite, Clubhouse, Cyberpunk.

What is a Joker Trojan?

It is a malware from one of the most active families in the Android ecosystem that gained popularity in 2017 by infecting many users by hiding within applications.

It has the ability to perform multiple actions on the victim’s computer such as reading text messages, subscribing to paid services through websites or installing spyware (Malicious software that infects your computer or mobile device and collects information about the user of the device, their browsing and their regular use of the internet).

In August 2021, the Belgian police warned that this malware was detected in 8 applications available in the Google Play store, while specialized sites such as Enterpreneur point out that from 2017 to the present, Google removed from its store about 1,700 apps that distributed this Trojan.

It is recommended that to be protected from this type of threat it is important to be vigilant before downloading any file or application on the devices.

As for apps, in addition to making them from official repositories, check the permissions they request, the comments of the users who downloaded them and the number of downloads. Finally, use an antivirus solution to prevent the download of malware on each of the devices that are used. (I)