Google has announced the App Defense Alliance under which the company is bringing more reinforcements to check for bad apps even before they hit the Play Store.
While Google Play Protect already scans the Play Store and flags malicious apps, the App Defense Alliance does a thorough scan before they are listed on the Play Store, which will dramatically reduce the chances of users downloading offensive apps accidentally.
The App Defense Alliance is made with three companies on board right now. It has partnered with ESET, Lookout, and Zimperium to form this initiative. Malicious apps that trigger spammy ads or serve malware have been on the rise and the App Defense Alliance will work to stop such apps from hitting the Play Store.
The three partners will integrate Google Play Protect detection into their own scanning engines which will bring an extra layer of eyes for all the apps that are queued to publish. Recently, Threatpost found over 172 malicious apps with over 335 million downloads in September this year.
Furthermore, 42 malicious apps with a collective download of 8 million were removed in October. With so many instances of bad applications being removed, the App Defense Alliance seems to be a welcome addition to amplify the security.
