Chinese Android Tablets Sold On Amazon Come With Trojan Dubbed "cloudsota"

[awsomecp173 (Senpai)]

Mobile Malware has been on the rise lately and cyber criminals have been using complex ways to infect devices. This trojan has been dubbed "cloudsota". It was recently discovered (at the time of writing this) by Cheetah Mobile when there were a lot of victims asking for help on forums such as XDA Developers and complaints on Amazon by buyers of the dodgy tablets with reports of their tablets going into "demo mode". The team at Cheetah Mobile started inspecting this piece of malware. 

 

Source: Cheetah Mobile

 

What they discovered is that when the device boots up, a modified android system file named "SystemUI.apk" checks to see if the "cloudsota" trojan is present. If not, it will overlay a big red "Demo" logo. Even if you try to remove the trojan it will restore itself.

 

 

 

As the Trojan is embedded in boot.img /cloudsota/CloudsService.apk, it is able to restore itself when a user reboots the device, meaning that it is very hard to get rid of.

 

The main job of this Trojan is to display ads. When the device boots, it will get information from the control server to get the settings for changing the browser's homepage. The trojan can also:

• Change the boot animation (most likely an advertisement)
• Uninstall applications silently (Usually anti-virus apps)
• Set the wallpaper to an ad
• Create annoying pop-ups

More than 150 countries are affected by this trojan. Mexico is currently the country with the most infected Android Tablets. 

 

 

Don't buy Cheap tablets.

 

Source: http://www.cmcm.com/blog/en/security/2015-11-09/842.html

[IPickle]

And this is why i go for a brand I know and trust

[iamdarkyoshi]

Brilliant. Another reason for people to make stupid claims about android "sucking"

 

"I bought this tablet from walmart and my ipad is way better"

 

Well of course it is when you paid ten times as much

[Nico559]

Aaaand that's what happens when you buy $80 tablets.

[Doughnutnator]

My cousin asked me yesterday that her tablet was running weird, and had a big DEMO thing.

Well, RIP for her. I'm not touching that thing.

[Lethal Seraph]

Well, you get what you paid for especially on knock off, sketchy brands. If you're going to cheap out, just get the budget tablets from reliable brands. I'm personally buying a few Amazon Fire ($25; 50% off starts Nov 26th) for the holiday.

[TetraSky]

And this is why i go for a brand I know and trust

Same here.

I always avoid shady brand from china when shopping for electronics, never know what they are putting in there. At least with an actual brand name, if they pull this kind of BS, they are going to get a lot of backlash. These chinese knockoff brand will just disappear and re-open with a new name a day later if they are found pulling this sort of stuff.

[GoldSrc]

Telling people not to buy cheap tablets it's pretty difficult here in Mexico lol.

Almost everyone and their dog has one .

[JAKEBAB]

Im not really into the whole rooting/flashing tablets/phones android etc but could this be fixed with a different rom?

 

Also why don't people just get that cheap Amazon tablet at least it's from a rep brand...

[QwarkDreams]

And this is why i go for a brand I know and trust

 

In general I agree, but think of Lenovo.