Hackers are taking advantage of the popularity of ChatGPT to trick people.
Researchers have noticed a rise in malware written for the Android platform that is attempting to impersonate the popular AI chatbot ChatGPT.
Researchers have observed a rise in malware written for the Android platform attempting to impersonate the popular AI chatbot ChatGPT application to target smartphone users, a new report showed on Friday.
According to researchers at Palo Alto Networks Unit 42, these malware versions emerged with OpenAI’s release of GPT-3.5, followed by GPT-4, infecting victims interested in using the ChatGPT tool.
Researchers have found two types of active malware – one is the Meterpreter trojan disguised as a “SuperGPT” app, and the other is a “ChatGPT” app that sends messages to premium-rate numbers in Thailand.
Furthermore, the report mentions that researchers uncovered a malicious Android Package Kit (APK) sample, which turned out to be a trojanized version of a legitimate application.
The valid application is an AI assistant built on the latest version of ChatGPT. If the exploit is successful, the malicious version of this application allows the actor to gain remote access to the Android device.
Another set of APK malware samples were also discovered by the researchers. On the surface, the malware appears to display a webpage with a description of ChatGPT. However, according to reports, there is a sinister motive hidden behind this threat.
Furthermore, all of these APK samples use the OpenAI logo, often associated with ChatGPT, as their application icon, adding to the misleading description that the application is affiliated with the ChatGPT AI tool.
These APK malware samples are capable of sending SMS messages to premium rate numbers in Thailand.
Premium-rate numbers cost more than regular phone numbers and are used in exchange for some type of service (eg, providing user information).
The report states that the business behind this collects earnings, but it can also be misused to conduct scams and fraudulent activities.
(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed – IANS,
