32 apps appear innocent but come with the ability to contact a command and control server in order to push a range of genuinely malicious apps, including the AlphaSMS toll fraud app widely circulated by East European gangs. The apps themselves included games and screensavers and were the work of four developers who might not be aware that their apps were being used as covers to get BadNews on to smartphones. Google was informed of the issue and had suspended the developer accounts, but it is hard to escape the uneasy feeling that criminals are successfully targeting Google’s Play at will.”]
Source: https://www.csoonline.com/article/2133344/google-play-apps-used-to-hide–badnews–mobile-botnet.html