Malicious apps and Android seem to have a strong bonding. Every few weeks such apps keep coming up in the market; this keeps Google busy; removing the malware all the time. Google at times uses the “kill switch” to disable all the already downloaded apps from all the Android devices around the world.

At the Next@Norton event last week, Eric Chien, Technical director for Security Response, Symantec researchers; showed some simple steps by which any trouble maker could build a Trojan. This was demonstrated by creating a quick new sample, as follows.

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Start with a simple free download of any app, preferably one which is popular.
The language complier takes textual source code and converts it into assembly language for the CPU to read and process, this is a one-way translation, with no way to go from the final executable file back to source code. Android apps are written in Java, you can easily decompile the target apps using simple tools.
The tricky step is where you have to obtain a nasty Java source code, like Android.Geinimi.
After adding the source code, copy it into the folder containing the existing course code. Make a small change to run the Trojan code before the whole app. Give it permission to have free access to the whole device. Then Chien tweaked the demo app’s name “FREE”.
The app is ready, once you compile it and upload to the market.

The good thing is that, malicious apps don’t last for long in the Android market. These apps can easily be spread in China as it has no official Android market.