Alcatel has started advertising its own Android devices using apps that come pre-installed on its own phones and which were recently updated in the Google Play Store.
As strange as it may sound for a company of Alcatel's size, several of its apps are promoting intrusive ads, including the launcher and the gallery. The latter, however, has undergone a series of silent modifications that certainly raise questions about how Alcatel handled the entire adware saga.
First of all, as reported by Android Police, the Gallery app has been renamed to Candy Gallery in the Google Play Store and has been automatically updated on all Alcatel devices running Android. The new app displays ads, and users have essentially no way to prevent this behavior once the update is complete.
What's really strange is that the previous update for the Gallery app was released in July 2017, and the new version released on January 27th of this year seems to be intended to introduce the adware. Even more strange is that the app, which previously required access to files, now asks users to allow it to read device ID information, SMS, Wi-Fi connection, and more.
Without any official statement from Alcatel yet, many are claiming that there is a small chance that the app key was stolen and used to push ads to users' devices. However, this is highly unlikely, given that Alcatel would have immediately removed the listings after the breach was discovered.
For information, the Google Play Store ratings perfectly reflect the unexpected behavior that Alcatel has incorporated into its applications
