Google removes 36 camera apps from Play Store due to malicious content

Google recently announced that it has removed at least 36 camera apps from its Google Play Store. According to Google, they have done this after being alerted of malicious content on these apps.  The 36 camera apps were added to Google Playstore in the latter half of 2019. The developers of these apps used malicious adware functions to get past Google's security scans.

According to Gadgets Now, these apps were developed by a Bot mitigation company called White Ops. These apps would bombard users with ads upon use. Some apps would even automatically take users to unverified and unrelated URLs.

Users faced difficulty in uninstalling these apps as they automatically hid their icons from the home screens of phones.

Google has advised all customers to uninstall these 36 apps if they had downloaded them before they were removed from the Play Store.

These are not the only apps that Google has removed from Play Store in the last few days. Google first took down 'Mitron' app which was an Indian version of the popular Chinese app TikTok. Mitron app was reportedly taken down after a few vulnerabilities were found in the app.  A few days later Google took down 'Remove China Apps' application which had become an overnight sensation in India as it removed all Chinese apps on one's phone. The app was removed as according to Google it violated Google Play Store's Deceptive Behaviour Policy.

The app had already been downloaded a million times before it was removed. The Remove China Apps developed by Jaipur-based OneTouch AppLabs came at a time when the anti-China sentiment was at its peak.

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