Many times, when you change SIM cards on Android or iPhone smartphones, you may receive a message from your device provider urging you to update your phone.
The notification from the provider automatically appears on your smartphone screen as a pop-up and informs you that an update is available. There, two options are provided. “Not now” and “Update”. Not updating could potentially affect the phone’s performance.
This is why in most cases the updates are performed at the same time, as the belief prevails that these pop-up messages are safe. Or are they not?
Last Wednesday, security researchers from cybersecurity Check Point Software made a revelation. According to research, some of the most popular Android smartphones, such as those from Samsung, Huawei, LG, and Sony, are vulnerable to phishing attacks. These attacks “hide” behind an otherwise innocent reminder to update from the provider.
Although this attack does not allow anyone to gain full access to your smartphone, it does divert all data entering and leaving your device, such as emails and search history, directly to the hacker's servers.
Of course, Check Point Software immediately informed the companies affected by the phishing attacks. Of these, Samsung and LG have already created and released the necessary fix, and Huawei is going to include its own fix in the next generation of the Mate or P series. On the other hand, Sony categorically refused to acknowledge the problem, stating that its own smartphones strictly follow the standard security specifications.
In any case, such attacks pose a significant threat to personal and corporate datacontained in smartphones and a definitive solution needs to be found immediately.
