0.51% of mobile users in Armenia faced attacks by banking Trojans in 2018, which is an increase compared to the 0.12% hacked users in 2017.

According to Kaspersky Lab Armenia, the share of affected users made 0.43% in Azerbaijan in 2018 as opposed to the 0.14% in 2014, while in Georgia, the indicators stand at 0.42% and 0.05% respectively.

“Mobile banking Trojans steal the data from bank cards and applications. Many of them can replace the bank app interface with their own, so that the users think they are entering the data in the bank app, but they are actually giving it away to the Trojan.

Fairly often, mobile banking Trojans intercept SMS texts from banks with confirmation codes or notifications about amounts written off the account. Some of these programs use fake interfaces of various apps that can request the card data, including the CVV code. The program makes the request and then intercepts the bank’s SMS reply and sends it to the cyber-criminal, enabling them to make transactions on behalf of the victim,” the lab said.

The experts recommend downloading apps only from official stores such as Google Play in order to avoid banking and other mobile Trojans. It does not guarantee total security, but the official platforms contain significantly less Trojans.

The experts also advise against installing software from third parties, which you can prevent by turning on the corresponding settings in your device.

“Do not forget to install the updates, which eliminate the vulnerabilities that cyber-criminals might use. You also need to think twice before following a questionable link in an email or SMS and only give apps the permissions they really need to operate. Use a reliable anti-virus on your device and check the system regularly: the anti-virus will detect and eliminate suspicions apps and prevent you from visiting malicious sites,” warned the experts with Kaspersky Lab.

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