essential applications

A sophisticated Android banking trojan campaign, known as Anatsa or TeaBot, has been downloaded over 220,000 times from the Google Play Store before its removal. The malware targets global financial institutions using a multi-stage infection process, deploying fake login overlays and exploiting accessibility services to steal user credentials and perform unauthorized transactions. The malicious app disguised itself as a "File Manager and Document Reader" and acted as a dropper, retrieving additional payloads from remote servers. It uses reflection-based code execution to evade detection and conducts anti-emulation checks to confirm it is on a genuine device. Anatsa requests critical permissions, including accessibility services and SMS access, to log keystrokes and bypass two-factor authentication. The campaign primarily targets users in Europe, especially Slovakia, Slovenia, and Czechia, but has the potential to expand to markets like the U.S., South Korea, and Singapore. It targets over 600 banking and cryptocurrency applications, enabling on-device fraud through automated transaction systems. Users are advised to avoid sideloading apps, audit app permissions, and monitor for updates from official stores. Google has removed the identified dropper, but similar threats persist. Indicators of compromise include specific network URLs and an MD5 hash for a sample.