Anyone who bought the fake antivirus Virus Shield app from Google’s Play Store will get their money back.
The app reached number in the Google charts after it was downloaded more than 10,000 times. However, researchers from the Android Police site checked it out and discovered that it was completely useless.
It Didn’t Do Anything Useful
After checking out the code on the app, the investigators realised that Virus Shield didn’t actually do anything useful at all. The advertising for it said that it would stop “harmful apps” from getting installed on the device. Instead, all it did was display a different icon when you “activated” the virus shield function.
The revelation led to the app being taken off the Play Store. It had been on sale there from the 28th of March to the 6th of April.
It cost £2.35 and Google will be refunding this money as well as giving an extra credit to users who were fooled into buying the app. An email note being sent to people who had downloaded explains that the refund should be in their account within 14 days. The extra credit – reported as being $5 – can be spent on digital content from Google Play. The email from Google confirms that the Virus Shield app made a “false claim” and that it didn’t provide the “one click virus protection” it claimed to offer.
Did you download this fake app or do you know of anyone else who did?
image courtesy of greenbot
