More than 98% of all existing mobile malware targets Android devices, Kaspersky’s recent Mobile Cyber Threats report reveals. For the first time, the report was prepared with some help from Interpol as a result of international cooperation to combat cyber crime.
Looking back to the analyzed 12-month period (August 1, 2013, through July 31, 2014), Kaspersky highlights the undisputed leadership of Android: Of the 300 million smartphones sold in the second quarter of 2014, Android devices accounted for 85%.
This also means Android-based devices “successfully” attract the attention of cyber criminals: Kaspersky estimates that 98.05% of all existing mobile malware targets Android users. After scanning the existing app storefronts in multiple countries, Kaspersky has found 175,442 instances of new, unique Android malware in the first half of 2014 alone.
To break it down into numbers: During the 12-month period, Kaspersky Lab security products reported 3,408,112 malware detections on the devices of 1,023,202 users. Also, the number of attacks per month increased from the 69,000 reported in August 2013 to 644,000 in March 2014.
The most-affected countries were Russia, India, Kazakhstan, Vietnam, Ukraine, and Germany, with trojans designed to send costly SMS messages being the most widespread malicious program in the analyzed period.
