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It is one of the most popular apps on the market with more than 40 million downloads. Apparently it is an innocent (and practical) keyboard for your smartphone. However, it has a trick: it takes your credit card to make purchases of premium products and services without your consent to earn money .

The application in question is called ai.type and sells itself as " the most personalized keyboards for your mobile and tablets " and they claim to work "learning your writing style, self-correcting typos and automatically inserting emojis ". However, what it also does automatically is to use your card without permission, thus achieving a juicy income of 18 million euros.

This has been demonstrated by an investigation of the Upstream computer security platform.

According to their discoveries, the app shows invisible ads and creates fake traffic by clicking on ads taking advantage of the large number of permissions - access to text messages, videos, photos, contacts and storage - that it requires in order to work on our phones.

It is an application that is available for both iPhone and Android phones. However, Google has recently removed it from its PlayStore. A measure that hinders new downloads for this operating system but, however, does not notify the millions of users who already have it installed and who may be victims of their tricks.

"The application carries out some activities hiding under other identities. Among them, disguising themselves as popular apps like Soundcloud, " the report's authors explain. In addition, they also indicate "a rebound in suspicious activity" since Google withdrew it from its application market.

That's how it works

According to Upstream's research, the app contained hidden files in its installation that were used for advertising purposes. Some files that "would serve to connect hiddenly to advertising services and, by executing the code, create false clicks on mobile ads " with the user's mobile.

Also, the application also used to download additional code with which to continue carrying out advertising activities . Something that, although apparently the users did not realize, contributed to a remarkable expense and battery.

Another of his most common activities was to take advantage of this hidden activity to make payments in premium services using the victims' cell phone if they found out. Thus, the cybersecurity company has detected 14 million suspicious transactions.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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