A study by Cybernews vividly illustrates this by looking at some forty free antivirus applications for smartphones and tablets. The observation is instructive: according to their tests, not only no application tested really protects the device against the bulk of threats.
Avoid these Android antiviruses, they are far from fulfilling their promises (in the best case)
But as a bonus, most of these applications are full of trackers, when they don’t outright contain links to domain names categorized as malicious. If you are looking for an effective antivirus for your Android smartphone, we recommend that you read this file.
Because ultimately most of these free programs seem to use their antivirus image to better exploit user data or even adopt malicious behavior. The most serious thing is that these solutions are all very popular.
The 40 apps tested by Cybernews have been downloaded some 918 million times in total, which means that one or other of these apps is likely on your smartphone. Here is the list of apps tested:
- Keep Clean Cleaner, Antivirus
- Fancv Booster – Cleaner, Antivirus & Speed Up
- Clean Guard Phone Cleaner
- APUS Security Antivirus Master
- FileMaster Manage&Power Clean
- Phone Security – Antivirus, Cleaner, Booster
- Dr.Capsule Antivirus, Cleaner
- Phone Junk – Clean Master
- JioSecuritv Mobile Security & Antivirus
- Antivirus – Cleaner + VPN
- One Security Antivirus, Clean
- PoMelo File Explorer & Cleaner
- One Booster Antivirus and Cleaner
- Antivirus One – Virus Cleaner
- Phone Cleaner – Virus cleaner
- Virus Hunter 2021 Virus Scanner and Phone Cleaner
- Fancy Battery – Battery Saver, Booster, Cleaner
- Super Clean-Master of Cleaner
- VG Kè°M-.MA© Web SDK
- Smart Clean-Booster, Cleaner
- Antivirus And Virus Cleaner Lock
- Antivirus, Virus Cleaner, Booster – Fancy Security
- Fancy Cleaner – Boost, Cleaner
- Antivirus – Virus Cleaner
- Powerful Phone Cleaner – Cleaner & Booster
- Memory cleaner Speed booster and junk removal
- GO Security – AntiVirus, AppLock, Booster
- CPU Cooler – Antivirus, Clean
- Virus Remover – security apps, booster, cooler
- SHAREit Lite – Share and File Transfer, File Manage
- AVC Antivirus & Virus Cleaner
- SmartSecurity
- Phone Cleaner, Booster, Master
- Super Antivirus – Clean Virus
- Security Antivirus – Max Cleaner
- Smart Cleaner
- Nova Security – Virus Cleaner
- Safe Security – Antivirus, Booster, Phone Cleaner
On the privacy side, we realize thanks to Cybernews that from the outset and apart from Super Antivirus – Clean Virus and VG Ke°M-…MA© Web SDK all applications contain several trackers which observe your online activities and preferences to better resell them to third parties. Half of the apps on the list have more than a dozen.
Which means that installing one of these apps allows a distressing amount of companies to suck up your personal data all the time. In terms of effectiveness against threats, only one application exceeds the score by 50% and again, by little: Keep Clean Cleaner, Antivirus. The application also contains a skewer of some 16 trackers.
Finally, Cybernews also demonstrated that some applications (Dr.Capsule Antivirus / Cleaner, GO Security – AntiVirus / AppLock / Booster, Virus Hunter 2021 Virus Scanner and Phone Cleaner, AVC Antivirus & Virus Cleaner,
Fancy Booster – Cleaner / Antivirus & Speed Up, and Phone Junk – Clean Master) contain downright malicious links.
All these applications remain available on the Google Play Store. It is advisable to avoid using the entire list, and is strongly recommended to uninstall those likely to contain malicious links. If you are looking for a real effective antivirus to protect your Android smartphone, the only real solution to recommend is to opt for the paid one.
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24 €
Internet Security
Our opinion : The best antivirus on all devices!
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Norton Antivirus Plus
€29.99
Norton 360 Standard
€34.99
Norton 360 Deluxe
€39.99
Norton 360 Premium
Our opinion : The most intuitive antivirus on the market
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2
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€29.95
Multi-equipment
Our opinion : The historical benchmark for Windows security
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Bitdefender, but also Norton and McAfee all offer very effective solutions to protect Android smartphones and tablets.
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See Norton 360 offers