Google is taking decisive action against 20 Play Store apps after they were found using malicious codes that are capable of spying on those who downloaded the app or software. Each of the apps were found monitoring emails, texts, voice calls and cameras of the ‘infected’ phones with around 100 consumers thought to have been duped into downloading the Lipizzan spyware in a major cyber security failing.

The apps in question were believed to have circumvented security measures designed to block spying by exploiting vulnerabilities in older versions of the Android operating system.

According to Google: “We have found 20 Lipizzan apps distributed in a targeted fashion to fewer than 100 devices in total and have blocked the developers and apps from the Android ecosystem.”

Source: The Drum