Android’s built-in malware scanner gets a failing grade

Enlarge / Google's app verification service introduced in Android 4.2.

Xuxian Jiang

A computer scientist has uncovered weaknesses in the application verification service Google recently rolled out to help users detect malicious apps on their Android smartphones and tablets.

"By introducing this new app verification service in Android 4.2, Google has shown its commitment to continuously improve security on Android," Xuxian Jiang, a professor of computer science at North Carolina State University, wrote in a brief report published Monday. "However, based on our evaluation results, we feel this service is still nascent and there exists room for improvement."

Jiang exposed Nexus 10 tablets running the Jelly Bean version of Android to 1,260 samples of malicious apps and found that the built-in scanner detected only 193 of them. That indicates a detection rate of just 15.32 percent.