Database Develop

Virus protection apps

Are these types of apps worth having on your phone? Like is there even a moderate chance you could get a virus (especially if you dont do lots of downloading)? I currently have the AVG free app and I find it kind of annoying having it scan everything I download and having it say protected by AVG on my screen, etc.
I have never heard of anyone getting a virus on their smartphone so I', leaning towards removing the AVG app. Would this be a mistake?

The only malware that are on Android affects Android versions < 2.3.3. You're fine.
As long as you're getting trustworthy apps on the market with a lot of downloads and not from a 3rd-party unauthorized website/app market/whatever. You're fine.
I personally use Lookout for the GPS feature, the Anti-Virus is just a sidebonus. I disable scheduled scanning because its not worth it.

It's much harder for malware to worm its way onto your Android than on a desktop OS. Generally it happens when people hide malicious activity in seemingly harmless apps. The only way to protect against that is to look at the requested permissions when you install things are make sure it is only using things it needs. Also, check the comments and use reputable developers from the Android Market.
Even these antivirus tools can't protect you from a malicious app though cos they have no way of knowing what you meant to allow the app to do and what it's doing without telling you.

i'm using Lookout it's free, and non memory resident if you choose not to
but still works when you install something new, it tells you if it's safe or not

I m using AVG as well as Lookout.. actually jsut trying them out. Thinking should I keep or Uninstall ? :/

there are also Symantec Antivirus, and McAfee both also "free" for basic features just like Lookout
but no where near as good and easy to use as Lookout
and there are a whole slew of new comers go the Antivirus industry for smartphones which i don't even recognize their names
a simple search for antivirus on market comes out with 3+ pages of well known and not so well known results
https://market.android.com/search?q=antivirus&c=apps

I want to see what's consuming my ram.

Hello everyone.
Even after hibernating all the apps, still 2GB of my ram is used. I want to look at all the processes that are using the ram. How can I do that?
Cheers!

Until someone comes up with a better answer...
Settings/Apps. Under each app there are stats for used storage and memory used in the past few hours. Might give you a clue.

xhamadeex said:
Hello everyone.
Even after hibernating all the apps, still 2GB of my ram is used. I want to look at all the processes that are using the ram. How can I do that?
Cheers!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Because ANDROID KNOWS that UNUSED RAM is WASTED RAM.
It ***preloads*** all of the things, in order of what it believes is the likelihood of you using those particular things.
This way when you actually DO use one of those things, it is ***already loaded*** (and starts fast).
Stop "hibernating" things. You are breaking Android.

doitright said:
Because ANDROID KNOWS that UNUSED RAM is WASTED RAM.
It ***preloads*** all of the things, in order of what it believes is the likelihood of you using those particular things.
This way when you actually DO use one of those things, it is ***already loaded*** (and starts fast).
Stop "hibernating" things. You are breaking Android.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmm.. You have a point..
So, is using Greenify a bad Idea?

xhamadeex said:
Hmm.. You have a point..
So, is using Greenify a bad Idea?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Bad idea.

yea there's two built-in ways to view running processes. One is directly Settings. Scroll down to where it says Memory. Open and check it out. I know. Google might as well not even wasted their time making that activity since it's next to useless. The other one is located in Developer Options. It's labeled "Running Services" and gives you stats on what apps are running, how long, etc. Yea, not very helpful either since there isn't much you can do besides uninstall some things or do the root and ransack thing. It's intentionally made like that, just like the way android battery stats are completely useless for nailing down offensive background services. Google likes it that way. They make money by tracking your location and serving you up with as many ads as possible. While it's true what dude said about the way Android preloads and makes a lot of stuff ready in RAM, hibernating, and using task killers is basically like working against your system resources, don't listen to people who yell things at you because they've been brainwashed by companies and developers who want their services installed, front-and-center, autostarting, and running 24/7 in your device's memory. Why else you think every website has a banner talkin' bout "oooh ooh install our app" and grant as many permissions as possible while some even go as far as sabotaging their own services via their website so users feel forced to install the app. They don't care about you, your cpu, or your experience as long as it's filled with ads and periodically uploading analytics and usage stats and the best way to do that is to have background and persistent services to silently restart their location polling or pointless notification systems designed solely around getting you to interact with the app. I'm not talking about things like email, messaging, or whatever other app you depend on or feel is important enough to keep close at a tap of finger. My suggestion is to analyze those settings activities I named earlier or a 3rd party one like BBS and make some decisions about what you are willing to delete. Compromises can be made depending on what's important to you and also with root. Half (or more) of the apps in your phone that have boot receivers and other various event listeners up the wazoo have no business knowing your phone is even on until you tap it's little icon. This is opinion of course because others will tell you you're breaking android and a bunch of other nonsense they've been fed by google to address the people, like me, who are tired of seeing google and other apps (usually ones my by behemoth corporations) that run constantly in the background even though I open up and use whatever particular app maybe once a week. If you're rooted, there is a lot you can do to take control of apps that like to stay nudged up as close as possible in the queue and keep open connections. It all depends on you and how you use your device. Don't listen to know-it-alls who yell at you IN ALL CAPS. Either accept the fact that google, facebook, admob (and whoever else app you have that thinks it's the most important) own your phone, or do a little research for yourself because regardless of what homeboy said, it's easy to see that available RAM feels way smoother than ram that has to wait for android to move pokey balls out of the way...just sayin

ElwOOd_CbGp said:
yea there's two built-in ways to view running processes. One is directly Settings. Scroll down to where it says Memory. Open and check it out. I know. Google might as well not even wasted their time making that activity since it's next to useless. The other one is located in Developer Options. It's labeled "Running Services" and gives you stats on what apps are running, how long, etc. Yea, not very helpful either since there isn't much you can do besides uninstall some things or do the root and ransack thing. It's intentionally made like that, just like the way android battery stats are completely useless for nailing down offensive background services. Google likes it that way. They make money by tracking your location and serving you up with as many ads as possible. While it's true what dude said about the way Android preloads and makes a lot of stuff ready in RAM, hibernating, and using task killers is basically like working against your system resources, don't listen to people who yell things at you because they've been brainwashed by companies and developers who want their services installed, autostarting, and running 24/7 in your device. Why else you think every website has a banner talkin' bout "oooh ooh install our app" and grant as many permissions as possible while some even go as far as sabotaging their own services via their website so users feel forced to install the app. They don't care about you, your cpu, or your experience as long as it's filled with ads and periodically uploading analytics and usage stats and the best way to do that is to have background and persistent services to silently restart their location polling or pointless notification systems designed solely around getting you to interact with the app. I'm not talking about things like email, messaging, or whatever other app you depend on or feel is important enough to keep close at a tap of finger. My suggestion is to analyze those settings activities I named earlier or a 3rd party one like BBS and make some decisions about what you are willing to delete. Compromises can be made depending on what's important to you and also with root. Half (or more) of the apps in your phone that have boot receivers and other various event listeners up the wazoo have no business knowing your phone is even on until you tap it's little icon. This is opinion of course because others will tell you you're breaking android and a bunch of other nonsense they've been fed by google to address the people, like me, who are tired of seeing google and other apps (usually ones my by behemoth corporations) that run constantly in the background even though I open up and use whatever particular app maybe once a week. If you're rooted, there is a lot you can do to take control of apps that like to stay nudged up as close as possible in the queue and keep open connections. It all depends on you and how you use your device. Don't listen to know-it-alls who yell at you IN ALL CAPS. Either accept the fact that google, facebook, admob (and whoever else app you have that thinks it's the most important) own your phone, or do a little research for yourself because regardless of what homeboy said, it's easy to see that available RAM feels way smoother than ram that has to wait for android to move pokey balls out of the way...just sayin
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Holy wall of text Batman!
You've got a couple of points hidden inside that rambling, but dude... If you want anyone to read that, try that little thing called paragraphs.

Didgeridoohan said:
Holy wall of text Batman!
You've got a couple of points hidden inside that rambling, but dude... If you want anyone to read that, try that little thing called paragraphs.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ah...apologies. I may have been a little bit hopped up last night on the leftover holiday spirits but how else to explain what I see as google's all-over-the-place ridiculous approach at making it as god awful experience as possible for people interested in granular control over their devices' /system. I just got done flashing, setting up, and going thru the motions on a new phone so I may have been a little annoyed as well. lolz hope it helps someone.

P9 anti virus

Is the built in anti virus on the P9 sufficient or is it advisable to download another one.
Any advice please.?

1. There are no viruses on Android
2. Most of apps that call them self anitivirus are nothing more but crap that beside sucking memory and battery do nothing
3. Most of problems that people call "virus" is nothing more but some crappy made app that mess up phone performance or download few other crappy apps in background like lockscreen or cleaner.
4. Build in antivirus on Huawei is just icon that do nothing... because it dont have anything to do, BECAUSE look at point 1.
Im using android for almost... forever of it existing, I was rooting and giving free access to all apps i could, I once did test and clicked all ads and installed all shady apps I could find, give them root access... and beside few more crappy apps that they downloaded in background... NOTHING.
Even my router logs didnt show any weird data that was send/recived in phone.
All you can get on your phone is viruses that are made for PC, that will transfer them self to it when you connect it to PC, this is only example that I know that someone had related to "viruses", but it was not even made for android...
All you need to do, to keep your device in good shape and safe, is to keep it clean, use build in cleaner that is good for removing trash files, and keeping an eye on permissions of apps, if app dont need internet access or contact list, remove that permission.
Simple as that...

This is pretty much it. Don't be the user that installs 5 cleaning apps / anti-viruses and wonder why the phone is so slow. I see users every week that slow their phone down with this stuff.

Maze Alpha X shipped with adware?

Accidentally I stumbled upon the folder gangyun and pref_storekeytool inside.
I scanned the Maze with an antivirus scanner and beautysnap.apk was reported as adware.
I guess beautysnap.apk is part of the system camera?
Unfortunately no app can beautify me, so I would like to delete this app. Is it safe to do it?
TIA

bestunameever said:
Accidentally I stumbled upon the folder gangyun and pref_storekeytool inside.
I scanned the Maze with an antivirus scanner and beautysnap.apk was reported as adware.
I guess beautysnap.apk is part of the system camera?
Unfortunately no app can beautify me, so I would like to delete this app. Is it safe to do it?
TIA
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What virus scanner did you use? I've just received my Maze Alpha X. There are some bad things about this phone, I'm a bit disappointed. The worst in my case is that the front camera doesn't work. It's like there's no camera at all.

Yeah unfortunately this phone is loaded with precarious apps, adupsfota for instance disguised as the ota wireless update is full of dodgy adware/spyware and if you look at the permissions your see just how worrying it is, it has permission to access banking apps, android pay, key-logger, microphone, camera the list goes on, I've disabled it several times but it manages to re-enable itself. Beautysnap is also a bad one which I have managed to disable for good, LocationEM2 is another suspect app, Fotaprovider which is also adups related. Basically this phone really needs an alternative kernel/custom rom before it can be safely used but as far as I'm aware there isn't one as yet.
The CPU usage is always very high too which is not a great sign, not good at all, I'm surprised Amazon can sell phones in this state tbh.

McSwifty said:
Yeah unfortunately this phone is loaded with precarious apps, adupsfota for instance disguised as the ota wireless update is full of dodgy adware/spyware and if you look at the permissions your see just how worrying it is, it has permission to access banking apps, android pay, key-logger, microphone, camera the list goes on, I've disabled it several times but it manages to re-enable itself. Beautysnap is also a bad one which I have managed to disable for good, LocationEM2 is another suspect app, Fotaprovider which is also adups related. Basically this phone really needs an alternative kernel/custom rom before it can be safely used but as far as I'm aware there isn't one as yet.
The CPU usage is always very high too which is not a great sign, not good at all, I'm surprised Amazon can sell phones in this state tbh.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Could you please say what scanner did you use?

dangerous666 said:
Could you please say what scanner did you use?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ive used a few but the adware/malware/spyware that the phone has installed as standard on the kernal/rom it's shipped with are installed as system apps with the exception of beautysnap so you need to go through them manually. I used an app called SystemPanel2, it's a great app that gives you a really complete overview of whats running on your phone and what not, it can record system processes, memory, battery and cpu usage over a period of time as well as network stats.

McSwifty said:
Ive used a few but the adware/malware/spyware that the phone has installed as standard on the kernal/rom it's shipped with are installed as system apps with the exception of beautysnap so you need to go through them manually. I used an app called SystemPanel2, it's a great app that gives you a really complete overview of whats running on your phone and what not, it can record system processes, memory, battery and cpu usage over a period of time as well as network stats.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I couldn't be able to find those suspicious apps. I've run a bunch of virus/malwares scanner, nothing reported. I've installed SystemPanel2 and I didn't find the processes you list. I believe our phones run different firmwares. I've got mine from Gear Best.

dangerous666 said:
I couldn't be able to find those suspicious apps. I've run a bunch of virus/malwares scanner, nothing reported. I've installed SystemPanel2 and I didn't find the processes you list. I believe our phones run different firmwares. I've got mine from Gear Best.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Under your Wireless Update system app what does it say? On mine for instance is says "com.adups.fota". If your firmware is good/clean then that's a good sign that if I put a fresh stock rom on here it should be fine, I was thinking maybe all the maze alpha firmware's were affected.

My com.adups.fota "seems" to be clean.
For hibernating apps on my rooted Alpha X I use SD Maid Pro.
Under app control you set several things
A) Hibernate the app
B) Disallow start on boot
C) Look up where all the files of the app are located
D) Remove app completely
E) etc

bestunameever said:
My com.adups.fota "seems" to be clean.
For hibernating apps on my rooted Alpha X I use SD Maid Pro.
Under app control you set several things
A) Hibernate the app
B) Disallow start on boot
C) Look up where all the files of the app are located
D) Remove app completely
E) etc
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No such thing as clean addups I'm afraid dude.
A newly discovered malicious app is found on China-made mobile devices running the Android OS. This is a baked-in system app used to update the device’s firmware but is found to also steal personal information, among other things. A blog is recently published about this malware by Kryptowire.
Already we have had inquiries on whether we detect Adups or not. The answer to that is I believe we do. You see, the app in question, which goes by the package name of com.adups.fota, has a couple of variants. There is an older version seen around 2014 and a newer version that emerged mid-2016. This older version we detect and have done so since 2014. I can verify that this older version was indeed pre-installed on various Chinese mobile devices bought cheaply on online stores, mainly Amazon. I know this because ever since we started detecting this older version of com.adups.fota, we have received support tickets periodically about why we are detecting a system app that cannot be uninstall—I’ll get to how to address this later.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/cybercrime/2016/11/mobile-menace-monday-adups-old-and-new/
I want to know if theirs a firmware for the Maze Alpha and the Alpha X without addups baked in, I hope so because it's a great phone otherwise.

SM-T719 is this app a virus or malicious

I have a Galaxy Tab S2 SM-T719, running Android 7, not rooted
I am generally pretty careful about the sites that I visit, but yesterday, a BBC app appeared, see attached screenshot
I am concerned about this because:
1) I do not recall installing it
2) I already have the official BBC app - which has a red background
3) When I select the App, there is no uninstall option
4) It does not appear in my list of Apps under Settings
5) It does not appear in 'My Apps and Games' in Playstore
6) I can not find this via a search on Playstore
Can anyone shed any light on this or suggest how I can remove it
Thanks for reading and any help

Search Google for that image.
Malicious jpeg that are downloaded can cause mischief in the folder they are in. They must be deleted! They will corrupt a database.
Don't move anything out of the download folder for now! Check for changes and any downloads you didn't do. Scan with Malwarebytes; it may find something but not necessarily all of what's there.
Treat all data on the device as infected for now; backup data but quarantine it from other Androids* and backup drives. Place backups on preferably on standalone OTG flashsticks or hdds.
Backup all critical data, NOW if not already done!!!
It may be a malicious app or trojan preloader manage to breach the browser. If the right conditions were met it may have install a rootkit or virus. If so it must be completely erraticate.
Again check the download folder. If in doubt delete entire it's content.
If you can't find and purge the infection, factory reset. Change all passwords after the reload.
Don't goof around if an infection is suspected. Take the device offline, now.
No time to dilly-dally Mr Wick, tik-toc...
After the reset if done be careful when adding your old data as it may be laced with a malicious file. Install only trusted apps. Keep trashware like WhatsApp, FB, Twitter, etc off of it.
*it's unlikely to cross infect a Windows system but best to isolate the data as much as possible to avoid rude surprises. Treat as infected until proven clean.

Blackhawk
Thanks for your suggestions
This may just spur me onto doing a LineagOS installation if I can resolve a couple of queries - posted here
LineageOS Installation queries
I would like to prolong the life of my Tab S2 SM-T719 (8 inch LTE, 2016), which is running Android 7, not rooted I have done a fair bit of reading through the various threads, but I have a couple of questions about the install - apologies if...
forum.xda-developers.com
It sounds like it might be best to do the factory reset and then do the installation

You're welcome.
If you're running Android 8 or lower a reflash may be needed if it got infected with that "immortal" rootkit that can hide on multiple partitions.
Apparently there is now a way to remove the dreaded Xhelper.
Be aware of this little nasty... check for it.
Android 9 and higher are immune to this one.