Context

In a latest, the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) has issued a detailed warning to people against the trojan called EventBot which has been identified as malware or trojan that steals personal financial information and can affect Android smartphone users in the country.

About

• EventBot is a mobile-banking Trojan and info-stealer that abuses Android's in-built accessibility features to steal user data from financial applications, read user SMS messages and intercept SMS messages, allowing malware to bypass two-factor authentication.
• The EventBot trojan has over 200 different financial applications under its target, including banking applications, money-transfer services, and cryptocurrency wallets, or financial applications based in the US and European region.
• The tricky part about a trojan such as EventBot is that it seems to be a trusted application, as per India's federal cyber-security agency. 

What is Trojan?

• A Trojan horse, or Trojan, is a type of malicious code or software that looks legitimate but can take control of your computer. A Trojan is designed to damage, disrupt, steal, or in general inflict some other harmful action on your data or network.
• A Trojan acts like a bona fide application or file to trick you. It seeks to deceive you into loading and executing the malware on your device. Once installed, a Trojan can perform the action it was designed for.
• A Trojan is sometimes called a Trojan virus or a Trojan horse virus, but that’s a misnomer. Viruses can execute and replicate themselves. A Trojan cannot. A user has to execute Trojans. Even so, Trojan malware and Trojan virus are often used interchangeably.
• Whether you prefer calling it Trojan malware or a Trojan virus, it’s smart to know how this infiltrator works and what you can do to keep your devices safe. 

Important terms

• Malware: Malware covers all sorts of software with nasty intent. Not buggy software, not programs you don’t like, but software which is specifically written with the intent to harm.
• Virus: This is a specific type of malware that spreads itself once it’s initially run. It’s different from other types of malware because it can either be like a parasite that attaches to good files on your machine, or it can be self-contained and search out other machines to infect.
• Worm: In the malware sense, they are viruses that are self-contained (they don’t attach themselves like a parasite) and go around searching out other machines to infect.
• Exploit: The strange behavior that can be used to create a hole for hackers or malware to get through generally requires someone to use a particular sequence of actions or text to cause the right (or is that wrong?) conditions. To be usable by malware (or on a larger scale by hackers), it needs to be put into code form, which is also called exploit code.

How to stay safe?

• CERT-In has suggested certain counter-measures for Android phone users to save themselves from the virus infection.
• These steps include not downloading or installing applications from untrusted sources like unknown websites or links sent over mail or SMS.
• Users should also look at the app reviews, details, number of downloads, and user reviews of an app before downloading from the Play Store.
• Other security steps include installing an updated anti-virus solution and keeping their phone updated with the latest Android updates and patches.
• Users should also exercise caution while tapping on URLs and avoid using unsecured or unknown Wi-Fi networks.