MADRID, March 8 (Portaltic/EP) –
Spain is he fourth country most affected by ‘stalkerware’ of the European Union with 296 affected users in 2022behind Germany, Italy and France, which occupy the top three positions in the ranking, according to a Kaspersky study.
Stalkerware is a type of spyware that is installed on a smart device without permission from its owner and that allows you to monitor your activity and steal data such as messages, location, activity on networks or even taking screenshots.
In this sense, the Kaspersky cybersecurity companyhas published its annual report ‘State of Stalkerware’which states that a total of 29,132 people were affected by ‘stalkerware’ during 2022. This figure has been reduced compared to the 32,694 users affected by this ‘software’ in the previous year.
However, the cybersecurity company warns that with this type of attack, digital harassment “continues to be very present.” In fact, according to the data in the report, Spain is in fourth position of the countries most affected in the European Unionmoving up one place compared to the 2021 report, with a total of 296 users affected.
Following this line, Germany, Italy and France occupy the top positions with 736, 405 and 365 users affected, respectively. from among the 176 countries in which the report detected cases of this type of spyware ‘malware’ all over the world, highlights Russia as the country that has suffered the most, with more than 8,000 users affected.
Stalkerware is used to spy on the victim without them knowing and, according to the data collected, are the women are most affected by this type of ‘malware’. In this regard, the Kaspersky Senior Manager of External Relations, Christina Jankowskihas emphasized that this trend is “worrying“So from the cybersecurity company they want to “generate awareness and combat this threat.”
Likewise, Jankowski has indicated that Kaspersky has updated its ‘Privacy Alert’ feature with concrete information about this situation for users. This alert explains that in case you discover that the device has ‘stalkerware’if the user decides remove it, whoever installed it will notice. Likewise, if uninstall software, test is lost that a ‘stalkerware’ had been installed.
In addition to all this, the cybersecurity company has recalled that collaborate with experts and organizations around the world to “combat domestic violence“. Thus, he referred to his recent participation with the Stop Gender Violence Association in a few days with the International Association of Police Members (IPA) in Euskadi.
In this collaboration, Kaspersky offered training for the use of its IT tool TinyCheck, which is used for the detection of spyware and digital bullying on tablets and mobile phones.
