Australians have been urged to urgently delete almost a dozen corrupt phone applications that experts have found to be charging unwitting users subscription fees.
Security firm Kaspersky warned of 11 popular apps available on Google Play that purport to be innocent but actually contain malicious malware called Fleckpe.
Apps like Photo Effect Editor and Beauty Slimming Photo Editor were among those found to be highly problematic for Android users.
“Every once in a while, someone will come across malicious apps on Google Play that seem harmless at first,” an article on the Kaspersky SecureList website by developer Dmitry Kalinin read.
“Some of the trickiest of these are subscription Trojans, which often go unnoticed until the user finds they have been charged for services they never intended to buy.
“This kind of malware often finds its way into the official marketplace for Android apps.”
While the apps have been removed from the Google Play Store, they were already installed on more than 620,000 devices worldwide.
They were believed to have signed users up for paid subscriptions without permission.
Those with these apps installed have been told to delete them immediately:
Beauty Camera Plus
Beauty Photo Camera
Beauty Slimming Photo Editor
Fingertip Graffiti
GIF Camera Editor
HD 4K Wallpaper
Impressionism Pro Camera
Microclip Video Editor
Night Mode Camera Pro
Photo Camera Editor
Photo Effect Editor
