Jay-Z 'Magna Carta Holy Grail' Malware App Infecting Phones Throughout The Country

You should always be careful when downloading music from the internet. The same applies for when users try to access the "Magna Carter Holy Grail" app that allows them to download Jay-Z's newest album. Representatives for computer security company McAfee have determined that hackers are using a clone of the app for Android phones to access information on the phones of downloaders.

The original version of the software allowed users of the Samsung Galaxy phone to download Jay-Z's new album on July 4. As is wont to happen, the album got leaked as did the app, which allowed non-Galaxy users to get a hold of it before July 7, the album's official release. It seems that hackers cloned the app and hid it on third party sites, and users weren't able to tell until July 4 that their phone had been hit. The malware seems to have a political bent however.

When activated, the image of the album art is replaced by the iconic image of Barack Obama, wearing headphones. The message "YES WE SCAN" is emblazoned on a banner over his head, presumably a commentary on the PRISM e-mail and phone scanning system recently revealed to be in use by the government. What's worrisome is that every time the phone is restarted, it sends information to a command-and-control server.

For now the cloned app seems like just a piece of political commentary, however the command-and-control in play leads some to believe that operators of the malware may try to use it to access financial information. McAfee's advice was to avoid downloading apps from third-party sources.

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Jay-Z