Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Smart Home
  3. News

Fake Alexa setup app for iOS taken down but could still be dangerous

Bruce Brown
By

If you downloaded One World Software’s scam “Setup for Amazon Alexa” iOS app from the iPhone App Store store, do yourself a favor and delete the app. If you already installed it, uninstall the app and then delete it. Fortunately, at least for all others, the fake app is no longer listed on the App Store.

The malicious app got as high as sixth place in downloads in the Apple App Store Utilities section and 60th place overall in Top Free apps, according to 9to5Mac. Before the fraudulent setup app was finally taken down Thursday evening, December 27, it had received more than 9,400 ratings, Venture Beat reported.

Recommended Videos

After reported sales of millions of Amazon Alexa devices during the Christmas season, it’s not surprising the app climbed high on the download list. Many owners who wanted to configure new Alexa devices likely used its name as a search term.

Related

The Echo Dot printed setup guide instructs owners to download the Alexa App on the iOS or Android app store. No other app is required to set up an Alexa device. However, when a search for “Alexa” returns a long list of possibles, choosing an app named for what you want to do, such as in this case to set up Amazon Alexa, seems logical.

Users who downloaded the app have not reported any specific harm other than wasted time. Many of its rapidly acquired ratings complained the app didn’t work.

The scam app users are required to enter their Alexa device serial number, IP address, and a name for the device. The app’s privacy policy goes on and on about the required permissions you must grant the publisher to use the app. Users must allow the publisher to collect, use, and share information about you and your actions online. The personal information on the list included, “IP address, browser information, referring/exit pages and URLs, clickstream data … domain names, landing pages, page views, cookie data … mobile device type, mobile device IDs … and location data,” Venture Beat reported.

Two additional apps published by One World Software, “Marketplace – Buy/Sell” and “Any Font for Instagram” have also been removed from the iTunes Store.

As anyone who has submitted an app for the iOS App Store review process can attest, Apple’s app screening is rigorous. Regardless, “Setup for Amazon Alexa” did make its way through the filters, which is disconcerting. But now the app has been removed.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Bruce Brown
Bruce Brown
Contributing Editor
Digital Trends Contributing Editor Bruce Brown is a member of the Smart Homes and Commerce teams. Bruce uses smart devices…
Netflix begins rolling out support for spatial audio, starting with iOS devices
Person listening to spatial audio using Apple AirPods Max headphones.

Apple's spatial audio feature, which works with the company's AirPods Pro earbuds and AirPods Max headphones, offers a pretty cool way to get immersive audio from both music and movies. Support for spatial audio, however, is far from universal when it comes to streaming video services, with the most notable holdout being Netflix. But that's about to change, aswe've had confirmation from Netflix that the streaming giant has begun to roll out spatial audio support to iOS devices.

Spatial audio, in Apple's world, works in two different ways. If you're listening to Apple Music on an iOS device (and soon, Android devices, too), you can use any set of headphones or earbuds to experience tracks that have been recorded in Dolby Atmos Music the way they were meant to be heard. Spatial audio provides that wide and airy 3D-like sound that typifies Dolby Atmos Music.

Read more
Everything Apple announced at WWDC 2021: iOS 15, MacOS Monterey, and more
Tim Cook Apple WWDC 2021

The Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) is one of the biggest events of the year for Apple developers, and this year's show is no different. Apple announced key updates across its entire ecosystem, with new releases for iOS on the iPhone, MacOS on the Mac, iPadOS for its line of tablets, WatchOS on Apple Watch, and so much more.

"We're excited to share our latest technologies with you and with the incredible community of millions of Apple developers around the world," Apple CEO Tim Cook said as he kicked off WWDC 2021 to an audience of developers represented by Memoji. "Your creativity and groundbreaking apps continue to deliver new and meaningful ways to enrich people's lives,"  "We've continued to look for ways to cultivate the next generation of developers, with an emphasis on those underrepresented in technology."

Read more
Mac usage is growing rapidly, but iOS still outpaces it by about 10 times
Man using a 24-inch M1 iMac.

Apple may have let slip the number of Mac users during its legal battle with Epic. Craig Federighi, Apple senior vice president of software engineering, revealed on the stand that the Mac's active user base is just one-tenth the size of the iOS install base, according to Mark Gurman's Twitter coverage of the trial for Bloomberg.

For comparison, when Apple launched its Apple TV+ video streaming service in late 2019, Oprah Winfrey revealed that iOS was installed on a billion devices, though the famed television personality did not give a specific breakdown.

Read more