Norton says AirDroid is malware

This morning (10.17.22) I received an alert from Norton 360 on my Pixel 5a running the latest version of Android 13 that the AirDroid app is malware. The app was updated on 10.16.22 to fix random crashes on phones running Android 13. Norton recommends uninstalling the app. AirDroid is a 4.1* rated app with 50M+ followers. Does anyone know what's going on and should I uninstall it?

I would hope, that issue gets corrected. 

SA

SoulAsylum:

FWIW!! The submission I presented to date is still being processed. Norton last updated the submission a week ago today. Not being given the attention it deserves.

SA

 FWIW. I made a submission some time ago and thought nothing was being done. I got the same information you show above about my submission, which was showing no update for over a week. I posted where @tomas_he was looking into other submissions and he posted that my submission had been resolved within the 48 hours. The submission page was not getting updated correctly.

 

FWIW!! The submission I presented to date is still being processed. Norton last updated the submission a week ago today. Not being given the attention it deserves.

image_2022-10-25_101719345.png

SA

Although this issue has been resolved for those of us who were receiving the malware alert, I wanted to let everyone know that I just received an email from AirDroid Support - “we contacted Norton360 again today and they said it would take 3-5 days to resolve the issue”. This is in response to their contacting Norton about the false positive. I will post the response here when I receive it from AirDroid.

Indeed!!

SA

One thing to remember is that the Mobile 360 versions rely mainly on cloud based definitions. So even if no definitions downloaded to a device, the online defs are the ones used first. And it would appear that they have been updated to remove the detections for this app.

 

Well, 72 hours and still being processed. I installed the app again and haven't seen any new notifications as before. The Norton mobile app live updates were the same as of this morning so they didn't change either.

Edited: Added new screenshot

AirDroid is now safe.jpg

SA

Yes, LiveUpdate is turned on in my settings.

teecatin:
I received a request from AirDroid support asking for the version # of my Norton 360 app. I also checked my updates list again and there was no update pending for Norton 360. However, when I clicked through Settings to my Norton 360 app, there was an active update button (dated 10.11.22). I installed that Norton 360 update and (nervously) reinstalled AirDroid, and did not receive a malware alert. So the question now shifts from the malware alert to why the Norton update did not appear in my update list. I do not auto-update because I have one very important app that must not update and, to the best of my knowledge, Android does not give us the ability to control the update status of an individual app, so I update manually daily.

Do you have the LiveUpdate setting turned on in your 360 app's settings. I do, and when I checked this morning, it shows last update 2022-10-20.   This setting allows for Norton to look after its own updates.

 So it seems that an update may have come through that has fixed the issue with AirDroid. 

Can others here confirm whether this is fixed for them?

 

I received a request from AirDroid support asking for the version # of my Norton 360 app. I also checked my updates list again and there was no update pending for Norton 360. However, when I clicked through Settings to my Norton 360 app, there was an active update button (dated 10.11.22). I installed that Norton 360 update and (nervously) reinstalled AirDroid, and did not receive a malware alert.

So the question now shifts from the malware alert to why the Norton update did not appear in my update list. I do not auto-update because I have one very important app that must not update and, to the best of my knowledge, Android does not give us the ability to control the update status of an individual app, so I update manually daily.

… and I’ve heard nothing further from the developer since I sent them my screenshots. Perhaps they’re troubleshooting together?

My Norton contact has confirmed they have received the submissions and are working on them.

I'll let you know if I hear any updates.

 

Just checked the submission again, its still being processed. Norton must be extremely busy for this to go past 48 hours.

SA

Nothing back from Norton as of this posting.

SA

I received an email from AirDroid this morning asking for screenshots. I replied and I will keep everyone advised of their responses.

I definitely will. Nothing from the developer yet.

Thanks for the post-back. I did submit a false positive report under Submission ID is: 4363c116-754b-41ee-88cc-31d28638bbb2. There isn't any link to myself in that submission so it isn't identifiable information. It should take 24 - 48 hours for the results. I will post back with those results when I have them. Please let us know what the developer replies with, if they do. 

SA

Thank you for the update, SoulAsylum. I will follow suit and uninstall it as well. I’ll post again if I get a reply from the app developer.

I installed this app on my Samsung Tab A tablet on Android 9. I did not get the same popups, or screens that SoulAsylum posted. I did see Red on the main 360 screen and when I tapped on the Security section, the screen showed red and App Security noted malware found. But when I tapped on that section, it did not show any Malware found information and the screen had turned green again?????? Seems there might be some difference in the detection and notification due to my being on an older Android version.

If this app has been used used before this detection, it sounds like a false positive detection. You can report false positive indications here   https://submit.norton.com/?type=FP