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Blasphemy! Godless malware preys on nearly 90 percent of Android devices Godless, an emerging mobile malware threat capable of rooting Android phones, has started to adopt the traits of an exploit kit, in that it searches for multiple vulnerabilities through which it can automatically infect a victim. Once it successfully executes, the malware gains root access to the device, granting it full control. Christopher Budd, global threats communications manager at Trend Micro, told SCMagazine.com in an interview that Godless is ostensibly an “encyclopedia of known, good attacks against various vulnerabilities… It's loading up on attacks and using whatever will work,...

COURTS ACROSS THE COUNTRY are grappling with a key question for the information age: When law enforcement asks a company for cellphone records to track location data in an investigation, is that a search under the Fourth Amendment? By a 12-3 vote, appellate court judges in Richmond, Virginia on Monday ruled that it is not — and therefore does not require a warrant.The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld what is known as the third-party doctrine: a legal theory suggesting that consumers who knowingly and willingly surrender information to third parties therefore have “no reasonable expectation of privacy” in that information...

A U.S. Federal Court jury finds Google didn’t need a license from Oracle for Android’s Java code, defeating Oracle's $9 billion claim. Oracle vows to appeal. Link Only Due To Copyright Issues From Bloomberg Article.

European Competition Commissioner Margarethe Vestager addresses a news conferenceBrussels, Belgium, January 11, 2016. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir - The European competition commission is gearing up to charge Google with giving unfair prominence to its own apps like search and maps in supplementary software licensing deals it strikes with mobile phone makers running its Android operating system, four sources familiar with the process said on Monday. Google generated an estimated $11 billion (9.73 billion euros) last year from sales of ads running on Android phones featuring Google apps. Android has become the dominant software in recent years, running most of the world's smartphones....

It may look like a simple calculator, but Google's latest Play Store upload signifies volumes about its changing approach to the Android platform. It's all too easy to miss the forest for the trees.This week's news surrounding a seemingly simple Android app launch is a perfect example. Maybe you heard: Google released a standalone Calculator app to the Play Store.SAY WHAT? A new Calculator app?! Stop the presses! Whoop-dee-freakin'-doo, right?Wait -- the app also adds native support for a smartwatch interface on Android Wear?! Okay, that's actually kinda neat. But it still isn't what makes this move important.The move of...

Google in 2012 sought to help insurgents overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad, according to State Department emails receiving fresh scrutiny this week. Messages between former secretary of state Hillary Clinton's team and one of the company's executives detailed the plan for Google to get involved in the region.

This Android phone maker's mobile payments service continues to lag Apple's own. Along with the launch of its iPhone 6/6 Plus phones, Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) introduced its very own contactless mobile payment system known as Apple Pay. Unsurprisingly, with the launch of its own Galaxy S6 smartphones, Apple rival Samsung (NASDAQOTH:SSNLF) released its own, very creatively named mobile payment system known as Samsung Pay.Also, it would seem that Apple Pay is utterly crushing Samsung Pay.Billions vs. just hundreds of millionsSamsung recently bragged that its Samsung Pay service is now up to 5 million users and they have spent "over $500 million"...

Freedom 251 smartphone, which went on sale Thursday, has sparked intense interest in India and beyond. Priced at 251 rupees ($3.65), the 3G device is being called the cheapest smartphone in the world. But it's also sparking questions about how the phone works -- and whether it's legal. Made by a new company called Ringing Bells, the Freedom 251 has a 3.2 megapixel camera and a 4-inch screen; it runs on Android's Lollipop 5.1 operating system and has slots for two SIM cards. But the phone also looks very similar to Apple's iPhone 4 -- even down to icons that...

Gartner has released its smartphone stats for Q4 2015 and the news is especially bad for Microsoft. In Q4 2014, the software giant owned 2.8 percent of the smartphone market -- not great, but still good enough for around 10 million units sold. In the same quarter of 2015, however, Windows Phone sales fell to 4.4 million, giving the OS a mere 1.1 percent of the total market. That means that it's basically in a death spiral, as consumers and app developers alike lose interest. Microsoft's rumored Surface Phone now looks like its last hope to rescue the division. The...

My buddy David Gewirtz recently wrote about the question of whether you should move from Windows 7 to Windows 10 or a Mac. I have another suggestion: Linux. Specifically Linux Mint 17.3, Rosa, with the Cinnamon desktop. Linux Mint 17.3 is a great replacement for Windows 7. In fact, it's a great desktop operating system period. sjvn Yes, I'm serious. I use all the above desktops -- yes I'm a Windows 7 and 10 user as well as a Linux guy -- and for people I think Mint 17.3 makes a great desktop. I've been using Mint as my main...

Turn on the Android spigot, please. According to Oracle Corp. (ORCL), Alphabet Inc.'s (GOOG) free mobile operating system Android has generated $31 billion in revenues for the company. The Redwood Shores, Calif.-based company has filed a lawsuit accusing Google of using Java to develop Android without paying dues. “Look at the extraordinary magnitude of commerciality here,” Oracle attorney Annette Hurst is quoted as telling a federal magistrate attorney judge in the courtroom in a Bloomberg piece. The revenue amount for Android is not peanuts. But, it still falls short of Apple Inc.'s (AAPL) earnings from iPhone by a wide...

The flaw is said to affect "tens of millions" of Linux PCs and servers, and most modern devices running the latest Android KitKat 4.4 software and later. A new, previously undiscovered flaw that allows an attacker to escalate local user privileges to the highest "root" level is said to hit "tens of millions" of Linux PCs and servers. Because some of the code is shared, the zero-day flaw also affects more than two-thirds of all Android devices. Israeli security firm Perception Point disclosed the flaw in a blog post Tuesday, but it wasn't immediately clear if the bug had been...

Live Photos to appear on new Samsung’s? Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Android Samsung’s upcoming Galaxy S7 will reportedly deliver with a new feature called “Vivid Photo,” which will be a clone of the Live Photos function on iPhone 6s, allowing users to shoot images that come alive when they are pressed. We already know that Samsung is planning to rip off Apple’s new 3D Touch feature for its latest Galaxy smartphones. Normally we’d be annoyed with the South Korean company for copying more of Apple’s moves, but Force Touch is so good, we want to see it everywhere. Now Android...

Google is replacing its implementation of the Java application programming interfaces (APIs) in Android with OpenJDK, the open source version of Oracle’s Java Development Kit (JDK). The news first came by a “mysterious Android codebase commit” from last month submitted to Hacker News. Google confirmed to VentureBeat that Android N will rely on an OpenJDK implementation, rather Android’s own implementation of the Java APIs. “As an open-source platform, Android is built upon the collaboration of the open-source community,” a Google spokesperson told VentureBeat. “In our upcoming release of Android, we plan to move Android’s Java language libraries to an OpenJDK-based...

Even if some malware families never get to cause worldwide damage, it's sometimes interesting to read about new techniques that some malware authors employ for creating their threats. One of the most recent cases is a malware family that targets Android devices in China, discovered by Symantec, and named Android.Spywaller. The uniqueness of this threat is the fact that during infection, the malware looks for Qihoo 360, a popular security app among Chinese Android users. Android.Spywaller uses a firewall to block Qihoo 360 internal communications The malware searches and registers on the device with the same UID (unique identifier) used...

Still no deal with Apple. Five of Australia's biggest banks have signed up with Google's Android Pay payments service as they continue to butt heads with Apple over Cupertino's own Apple Pay platform. ANZ Bank, Westpac, ING Direct, Macquarie Bank, St George, Bank of Melbourne, Bank of South Australia and Bendigo Bank will all support the Android payment service when it lands in Australia in the first half of next year. At launch, Android Pay will support Mastercard and Visa credit and debit cards, Google said in a blog post today. The company is currently "working with Eftpos" on similar...

Not content to have Cortana controlling Windows Mobile, Microsoft has released a toned-down version of its personal assistant tool for iOS and Android handsets. Redmond said that Cortana will run in a diminished capacity on the Apple and Google smartphone OSs, but will still allow users to link up their handsets with Windows PCs to sync and automate tasks. "Cortana was created to be a truly personal digital assistant - available on the go, no matter where or when you need help, and on whatever device you carry," wrote Cortana group program manager Marcus Ash. "That's why it's important to...

Speaking at Samsung Electronics' 2015 Investors Forum, a series of company executives spent hours saying very little, while talking about "innovations" such as phase detection Focus Pixels and camera sensor Deep Trench Isolation that iPhones already have. Source: Samsung Samsung will "lead by following" Apple Watch Samsung LSI marketing team head Kyushu Hong spoke at length about "Innovation for the next mobile experience," outlining plans to introduce a "Bio Processor" chip that packed a series of components related to health related data recording. Source: Samsung Asked when the new chip would be introduced and when Samsung expected it to become...

We've seen Android malware that takes your photos and videos for ransom, and there's one that can mimic your phone's shutdown process and spy on you even though the phone appears to be off. But a new family of malware, detailed by security firm Lookout on Wednesday, is probably the scariest we've heard of: It's so hard to remove that, in some cases, victims might be better off just buying a new device. Lookout's researchers have found 20,000 samples of three pieces of malware, named Shedun, Shuanet, and ShiftyBug, which share a lot of the same code and use similar...

This is a bad Android Root Kit baddy. . . as the headline says, it is almost impossible to remove from Android devices. More information at Ars Technica's site (link only due to copyright concerns): New type of auto-rooting Android adware is nearly impossible to remove