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Some popular apps on your Android phone can actively listen to you, monitor your habits and even secretly take screenshots of your activity and send them to third parties, according to a new study.
These screen captures and on-screen activity videos could include user names, passwords, credit card numbers, and others. important personal information, the researchers said.
"We found that each application has the ability to record your screen and anything you type," said David Choffnes, a professor at Northeastern University in Boston.
The results will be presented at the conference on the "Privacy Enhancing Technology Symposium" in Barcelona.
For the study, the team analyzed more than 17,000 of the most popular applications on the Android operating system. students.
In all, 9,000 of the 17,000 applications showed the potential to take screenshots.
"There was no audio leak, not a single application turned on the microphone," said Christo Wilson, Professor at the University.
"Then we started to see unexpected things: applications automatically took screenshots of themselves and sent them to third parties."
Although these breaches of confidentiality appear benign, they point out
"This opening will almost certainly be used for malicious purposes, it is easy to install and collect this information, and the most disturbing is that it occur without user notification or authorization, "Wilson noted. .
Although the study was conducted on Android phones, there is no reason to believe that other operating systems would be less vulnerable, according to the researchers.
Another study, published in Headache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain, found that apps developed to help people track their migraine pain often share information with third parties, which poses privacy risks in part because there are few legal protections against the sale or disclosure of data from medical applications to third parties. It is estimated that nearly half of the 3.4 billion smartphone users will use health-related apps, and currently, there is a wide range of apps on the market for various neurological and pain conditions. " says Mia Minen, from New York University. Center in the United States.
"We believe that our study may have extended implications for people suffering from various chronic diseases," added Minen
– IANS
rt / mag / vm
(This story was not edited by Business Standard staff and is generated automatically from a syndicated feed.)
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