Cyber Crime

Hackers compromised APKPure client to distribute infected Apps

APKPure, one of the largest alternative app stores, was the victim of a supply chain attack, threat actors compromised client version 3.17.18 to deliver malware.

Multiple security experts discovered threat actors tampered with the APKPure client version 3.17.18 of the popular alternative third-party Android app store.

APKPure is available only on devices that use Google Mobile Services (GMS) and are firmly tied to Google’s infrastructure.

The tainted client downloads and installs various apps, including other malicious payloads.

“Doctor Web specialists have discovered a malicious functionality in APKPure—an official client application of popular third-party Android app store. The trojan built into it downloads and installs various apps, including other malware, without users’ permission.” reads a post published by Doctor Web.

The analysis of the code of the client revealed that attacker modified it by injecting the Android.Triada malware.

Triada was designed with the specific intent to implement financial frauds, typically hijacking financial SMS transactions. The most interesting characteristic of the Triada Trojan apart is its modular architecture, which gives it theoretically a wide range of abilities.

The Triada Trojan is able to infiltrate all process running on the mobile devices gaining persistence, it allows threat actors to download, install/uninstall payloads without users’ permission.

Researchers from Kaspersky pointed out that attackers compromised the APKPure version 3.17.18 with a tainted advertisement SDK.

“Which Trojan gets downloaded (in addition to APKPure’s built-in one) depends on the Android version, as well as on how regularly the smartphone vendor released — and the user installed — security updates.” states Kaspersky.

“If the user has a relatively recent version of the operating system, meaning Android 8 or higher, which doesn’t hand out root permissions willy-nilly, then it loads additional modules for the Triada Trojan. These modules, among other things, can buy premium subscriptions and download other malware. If the device is older, running Android 6 or 7, and without security updates installed (or in some cases not even released by the vendor), and thus more easily rootable, it could be the xHelper Trojan.”

APKPure has solved the problem with the release of the version 3.17.19, on April 9.

“Fixed a potential security problem, making APKPure safer to use,” reads the release note of the new version.

This week another supply chain attack made the headlines, the German device maker Gigaset announced that threat actors compromised at least one server of the company to deliver malware.

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, supply chain attack)

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Pierluigi Paganini

Pierluigi Paganini is member of the ENISA (European Union Agency for Network and Information Security) Threat Landscape Stakeholder Group and Cyber G7 Group, he is also a Security Evangelist, Security Analyst and Freelance Writer. Editor-in-Chief at "Cyber Defense Magazine", Pierluigi is a cyber security expert with over 20 years experience in the field, he is Certified Ethical Hacker at EC Council in London. The passion for writing and a strong belief that security is founded on sharing and awareness led Pierluigi to find the security blog "Security Affairs" recently named a Top National Security Resource for US. Pierluigi is a member of the "The Hacker News" team and he is a writer for some major publications in the field such as Cyber War Zone, ICTTF, Infosec Island, Infosec Institute, The Hacker News Magazine and for many other Security magazines. Author of the Books "The Deep Dark Web" and “Digital Virtual Currency and Bitcoin”.

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