ANDROIDOS_KAGECOIN.HBT

 Analysis by: Veo Zhang

 THREAT SUBTYPE:

Click Fraud, Hacking/Cracking Tool

 PLATFORM:

Android OS

 OVERALL RISK RATING:
 DAMAGE POTENTIAL:
 DISTRIBUTION POTENTIAL:
 REPORTED INFECTION:
 INFORMATION EXPOSURE:

  • Threat Type: Trojan

  • Destructiveness: No

  • Encrypted:

  • In the wild: Yes

  OVERVIEW

Infection Channel:

Via app stores

To get a one-glance comprehensive view of the behavior of this Trojan, refer to the Threat Diagram shown below.

This malware mines bitcoins via mobile devices. It imitates the app TuneIn Radio to trick users into thinking that it is legitimate. Note that it inserts miner code to the original app.

  TECHNICAL DETAILS

File Size:

3,972,828 bytes

File Type:

APK

Memory Resident:

Yes

Initial Samples Received Date:

28 Feb 2014

Payload:

Connects to URLs/IPs

NOTES:

This malware mines bitcoins via mobile devices. It imitates the app TuneIn Radio to trick users into thinking that it is legitimate. Note that it inserts miner code to the original app.

It steals CPU miner modules from the legitimate app Crypto Miner. To hide the code, it modifies the Google Mobile Ads SDK and hides the miner code in it.

The miner is started as a service when Internet connection is available. It launches the CPU miner to connect to a http://flow.{BLOCKED}o.me:9xxx then redirectS to an anonymous DogeCoin mining pool.

It updates its configuration to change the mine pool link from http://poolsaturn.{BLOCKED}h.net/update.php?p=data. According to analysis, one of the pool links found is tcp://eu.{BLOCKED}pool.com:3333, an anonymous multi-coin mining pool.

This malware can drain the device's battery life.

  SOLUTION

Minimum Scan Engine:

9.700

TMMS Pattern File:

1.699.00

TMMS Pattern Date:

21 Mar 2014

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