WARNING over Amazon Black Friday 2015 deals CON

Security experts have warned Amazon shoppers over the popular con circulating online

BARGAIN hunters have been warned about a popular con circulating online – days before Amazon launches its Black Friday sales.

If you stumble across an app offering too-good-to-be-true deals from Amazon – do NOT download it.

A terrifyingly Android app, which looks surpringly legitimate and claims to offer early access to Amazon's hugely popular Black Friday 2015 Lightning Deals, is being shared online.

But rather than unlock killer online bargains, the unofficial Android shopping app just steals customers' personal details, security experts Zscaler has warned.

As soon as the fraudulent Android app is installed, it disguises itself as a legit looking Amazon app and loads another app named "com.android.engine", which silently harvests your call logs, inbox messages and contact details in the background.

 

Shoppers have been warned to only download mobile apps from the Google Play and Apple App Stores

Zscaler claims the fraudulent Amazon app is especially dangerous as it continues to work even after the user deletes it form their smartphone or tablet.

The security company issued the warning on its offical blog: "Once this malicious app is installed on the victim's phone, the fake Amazon application will start giving the error message: 'Device not supported with App'.

"This forces the victim to delete the fake amazon app thinking that there were some errors while installing it.

"As the malicious child app does not have any icon, it is quite difficult for the common users to remove the app."

 

 

Customers need to be extremely caution whenever they download apps from the internet onto their computer or smartphone.

Cyberthieves often use days like Black Friday and the Christmas to drive traffic to their fraudulent apps.

Zscaler's advice is simple – only install applications from legitimate sources such as the Google Play Store, or Apple App Store.

 

Also, it is always worth noting the permissions requested by the application during the installation.

Although the official Amazon Android app, the US online retail firm says "this permission is used to simplify the process of phone number verification when creating an Amazon account registered to your mobile phone number."

• You can find the verified Amazon shopping apps for Android, here, and iOS, here.