The amount of funds stolen from Russian bank accounts using Android-based viruses has risen by almost five-fold in one year, the Kommersant newspaper reported Thursday.
Cyber-criminals stole 348.6 million rubles ($5.5 million) between April 2015 to March 2016, a 471 percent increase compared to the same period from 2014 to 2015.
Some 350 Android-device users become victims of cyber-theft in Russia every day, Kommersant reported. The number of Russians using mobile devices to transfer money in grew from 16.8 to 20.7 percent, according to data from the Bank of Russia.
A spokesperson for Russia’s largest bank, Sberbank, maintained that anti-virus protection was being continually updated, and that the trend was expected to soon plateau, Kommersant reported.
