More and more viruses are targeting mobiles rather than our good old desktops.

While you can take precautions to avoid contamination, it's not always easy to know if your smartphone has been infected.

However, a few signs allow us to confirm a priori.

Pop-up advertisements appear on your smartphone screen

When pop-up advertisements appear on your smartphone screen even when you are not using your browser, there is bound to be a problem.

You are most certainly the victim of adware, pirate software that sends you advertising without your consent to earn income without your knowledge.

Be careful, however, of shortcuts. Many free apps include advertising, which will appear briefly on your screen between loads. Many users also tend to think that their smartphone is the victim of adware because they receive advertising notifications on their mobile, notifications which may be perfectly legal if they have adhered to the terms of certain applications or subscribed to notifications. push on websites - often by validating GDPR terms a little too quickly (you know, that annoying cookie message).

What should spark your ears is the sudden appearance of an advertising message on your home screen or on top of another application, on a recurring basis.

There is usually no miracle in the methodology to get rid of it.

This will most certainly involve resetting your smartphone to factory settings.

Your data consumption is exploding, even though you hardly use it

Some malware simply retrieves data about you without ever revealing itself to you.

They can also use your smartphone to mine cryptocurrencies, in which case you will inevitably see an increase in your data consumption.

Unfortunately, it is very complicated to make sure that you are a victim of malware of this type if you use your data connection a lot.

Otherwise, an abnormal peak in consumption should put you on the spot.

Another clue, however, makes it possible to identify such an anomaly: if the autonomy of your smartphone has decreased a lot over the last few months and that it sometimes tends to heat up abnormally when you are not using it, it is that someone uses it without your knowledge for heavy tasks.

An app that you have not downloaded has appeared on your smartphone screen

Many malware installs unwanted software on their device without the knowledge of a smartphone owner. If you see an app appear overnight that you haven't installed yourself, you have to be a victim of malware.

Fortunately, this is the easiest software to uninstall.

If your smartphone has Safe Mode, activate it.

In your mobile settings, search for "downloaded applications" and check which applications have been installed recently.

By clicking on them, you will be able to uninstall them manually.

Now search for "Device manager apps" and check which apps have been granted administration rights for your smartphone.

If you find any questionable apps, delete them from your smartphone.

After a quick reboot, everything should be back to normal.

Your friends are receiving messages from you that you haven't sent

If some of your friends show you proof that they received a message from you that doesn't appear in your texts, believe them.

It is possible that you are the victim of software that sends premium-rate SMS or has hacked one of your accounts (WhatsApp, Facebook, etc.).

If it is SMS, it is better to reset your smartphone to factory settings to fix the problem.

If your Facebook account is sending messages, it has been hacked.

Enable two-factor authentication and change the password to fix the problem.

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  • Cybersecurity

  • Cyber ​​attack

  • Personal data

  • Smartphone

  • Computer virus

  • Mobile app

  • High-Tech