Almost one billion Android users are vulnerable to a security bug

It has been revealed that an Android bug is exposing almost one billion Android handsets to a security vulnerability.

The said vulnerability affects phones that are running versions of Android below 4.4 KitKat — about 939 million handsets.

All was revealed by security expert Tod Beardslet, a Rapid7 analyst, who explained that the problem lies with Android WebView. This dated bit of software allows apps to show web pages without having to open up a different application.

Google replaced this software with KitKat, but for anyone running Jelly Bean or an older version of Android, it doesn’t sound like Mountain View is interested in fixing the problem.

Google’s response was as follows: “If the affected version [of WebView] is before 4.4, we generally do not develop the patches ourselves, but welcome patches with the report for considerat ion. Other than notifying OEMs, we will not be able to take action on any report that is affecting versions before 4.4 that are not accompanied with a patch.” Around 60 per cent of Android devices currently run Jelly Bean or lower.

I f you’re running 4.4 KitKat or Lollipop, then you’ve got nothing to worry about. Otherwise, you better start updating as soon as possible.