Google removed 13 apps from its Google Play app store this weekend after the apps were discovered to contain malware.
The apps were downloaded a total of 560,000 times before they were removed from the store. All 13 were made by the same developer, Luiz O. Pinto, who had disguised the apps as car racing games. When people who downloaded the games tried to launch them they would crash; however, they would still install malware on the person’s phone or tablet, NDTV reports.
The apps in question would reportedly hide themselves and their icons once you launched them, and would ask users to install an additional APK called ‘Game Center’ to their device.
Two of the apps made it to Google Play’s trending section before they were removed.
The removed apps include:
Luxury Cars SUV Traffic
Car Driving Simulator
Extreme Car Driving Racing
Moto Cross Extreme Racing
SUV City Climb Parking
Extreme Car Driving City
City Traffic Moto Racing
Extreme Sport Car Driving
Hyper Car Driving Simulator
Truck Cargo Simulator
SUV 4×4 Driving Simulator
Firefighter – Fire Truck Simulator
Luxury Car Parking
If you downloaded one of the impacted apps, you should uninstall it and then use a trusted antivirus app such as 360 Security or AVG Virus to scan your device and make sure the malware is removed and that no other apps on your device are infected.