Stalkerware infiltration decreases by 67% in India

The number of users impacted by stalkerware increased by 35 per cent in the first eight months of 2019 compared to the same period last year, Kaspersky study shows. Between January to August this year, a number of users that encountered at least one stalkerware installation attempt surpassed 37 thousand, resulting in a 35 per cent increase than the same period last year. The report says the threat landscape for stalkerware has widened as cybersecurity experts and researchers have discovered 380 variants of stalkerware this year, which is 31 per cent increase than last year or so.

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What is stalkerware?

Stalkware, as study describes, is commercial spyware used as a 'tool for domestic espionage.' As the name Stalkerware suggests, in a nutshell, it is a set of programs that attempt to intrude into a person’s private life. With the help of stalkerware, bad actors can access your personal messages, your photos, social media, geolocation and audio/camera recordings and in some cases, live feed from your device's camera. Stalkware programs usually run hidden in the background 'without a victim's knowledge or consent.'

Key findings

-- Between January to August this year, 37,532 unique users were targets of at least one attempt to infiltrate their device with stalkerware.

-- In comparison, the figure for 2018 was 27,798 unique users.

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-- These numbers equal to nine per cent of users attacked by financial threats detected in the first half of 2019.

-- Between January to August 2018, almost 300 (290 to be specific) potentially dangerous variants of stalkerware were detected.

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-- This year, that number has grown by nearly a third, to reach 380.

-- In spite of 35 per cent of the global increase in terms of the number of stalkerware attempts, researchers see a significant decrease of 67 per cent in India.

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"The good news is that even though the number of users that encountered ‘stalkerware’ has increased 35% globally, we have seen a drastic drop of approximately 67% in India, which shows that we are moving in the right direction in progressing as a Digitally Smart nation. It can be said that Indian citizens are increasingly aware of the various threats that they can be a target of and are now more careful of whom they share their phones with and what kind of information are they sharing online. The drop in numbers comparatively to last year can be seen in a very positive light towards our fight against cybercrime." Said Mr. Saurabh Sharma, Senior Security Researcher (GReAT), Kaspersky (APAC).

Picture: Kaspersky Blog