Images and comments are popping up all over the place showing and discussing how Huawei’s phones are calling the Google app a virus if installed on one of the manufacturer’s phones. A photo posted on Reddit (via 9to5Google) shows a warning that appeared on Huawei’s four-year-old P30 flagship phone. The notification says “Security threat. Google appears to be affected. Immediate uninstallation is advised.” A button at the bottom of the pop-up screen will uninstall the app.
The owner of the Huawei P30 scanned his device and found no viruses. Another user on Reddit had the same message pop up on his Huawei P30 Lite. He wrote, “Just got it as well, Huawei P30 Lite. Thing is, I don’t even use Google, so I got extremely freaked out. Have never had an issue like this, but seeing as how we all got it around the same time, it’s probably an update or something.”
Huawei lists the Google app as a TrojanSMS-PA virus. A Trojan program is malware disguised as a legitimate app so that the victim installs it. Once installed on a device, the malware could give the attacker the same level of control over a device that the legitimate user has. Some Trojans are designed to steal the login information used to open banking and financial apps; the goal is to get into the target’s bank account to wipe him/her out.
The Google app is flagged by Huawei
Another screenshot shows a warning stating that the Google app is infected. The warning from Huawei adds, “This app was detected sending SMS privately, enticing users to pay with adult content, downloading/installing apps privately, or stealing private information, which may cause property damage and privacy leakage. We recommend uninstalling it immediately.”
Google apps are not supposed to be available on newer Huawei devices which is why the Alphabet subsidiary is not commenting on the situation. And since we all know that the Google app is not a virus (we all know that, right?), the blame for this screw-up must lie with Huawei.
Google accidentally flags Samsung Wallet and Samsung Message
We don’t believe that Huawei is doing this on purpose to paint Google in a negative light and that some mistake is causing Huawei’s software to identify the Google app as a security threat. After all, last week we told you that Google Play Protect, the tool used to try and keep malware off your Android device by running a safety check on them before they are installed, accidentally flagged Samsung Messages and Wallet suggesting that the apps be uninstalled.
If this message keeps appearing on your Huawei phone, you might try clearing the cache of the Phone Manager app as that seems to fix the problem.
