Android malware is using TOR network to remain anonymous

As technology evolves and network providers shore up their security, hackers generally remain several steps ahead. Botnets, often used to force compromised slave computers to flood websites with traffic and bring them down in distributed-denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks or to send spam and phishing campaigns, are a common problem, and may now be harder to track.

Kaspersky Lab has spotted malware for the Android mobile operating system employing the TOR anonymity network, a development previously only seen on Windows. TOR, short for The Onion Router, is software that offers users a greater degree of privacy when browsing the Internet by routing encrypted traffic between a user and a website through a network of worldwide servers. TOR can also be used to host websites on a hidden network. The Android malware uses a TOR website as a command-and-control server, wrote Roman Unuchek of Kaspersky. Command-and-control servers are used to send instructions to the malware.