Evolution of the android malware which targeted mobile financial services

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Presented at AVAR 2014 by

Sijoon Park

Seungwon Lee

Mobile financial services such as online banking via smartphone are becoming more mainstream in many countries. As they are getting more popular, the number of malicious codes that exploit the security loopholes of smartphones OS has been on the rise. The first of such occurrences was reported back in October 2012 where it targeted Android OS and illegally charged its users approximately $280 per month in Korea. The codes have recently evolved to collect sensitive personal data such as number of security card and certificate data used for mobile banking services. To infect Android running smartphones, whose security loopholes are less known than PCs, they have come up with various new methods that include SMS, instant messenger, bot implant, collection of personal data from various sources, utilizing existing Windows viruses via cross-platform tools, and etc. Some of the methods were never seen before in the PC environments, and their various ways to disguise as legit apps make it harder to detect and clean. I'll examine the following topics with the real-life examples in the paper: Evolution of the malicious codes on smartphones Main functions of the malicious codes and how they are used to illegally collect money from smartphone users Ways to prevent such financial damages and what the Korean government, financial institutions, service providers, and online security firms are doing.