Android users are being warned to delete 85 apps which infect a device and install malware.

More than nine million people are believed to have been affected.

The scam peppers its victims with adware and monitors their screens to make money for the scammers.

The games and apps pose as genuine and can be found on the Google Play store, offering a false sense of legitimacy to unsuspecting users.

Cybersecurity experts have urged people to uninstall the apps immediately.

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The games and apps pose as genuine and can be found on the Google Play store, offering a false sense of legitimacy to unsuspecting users. Cybersecurity experts have urged people to uninstall the apps immediately

Android users are being warned to delete 85 apps (pictured) which infect a device and install malware. More than nine million people are believed to have been affected

Trend Micro found the apps, despite appearances, are not legitimate.

They take on the guise of games, TV apps, news apps or remote control apps but it is a front for the vicious software which attacks your device.

One of the apps, 'Easy Universal TV Remote', promises to control a TV with the smartphone but it has been found to contain the offending malware.

It has already been downloaded more than five million times.

Many of the faux apps are littered with bad reviews revealing the games do not work well and crash repeatedly, a telltale sign the download to be a sham.

The ads berate users with advertisements and are notoriously difficult to swipe away or click off.

They are also designed to work in the background, draining battery, data and processing power.

HOW TO AVOID DOWNLOADING MALWARE? A common piece of advice for consumers to avoid downloading apps riddled with malware is to ensure they only download apps directly from bona fide sources. These include the App Store and the Play Store. However, malicious apps occasionally make it through to these sites so people should be cautious. Apps with poor spelling and grammar are often a telltale sign and so is an unknown developer. Download reviews with several poor reviews also often indicates it is likely to be a disguise for the malware. Advertisement

One of the apps, 'Easy Universal TV Remote', promises to control a TV with the smartphone but it has been found to contain the offending malware. It has already been downloaded more than five million times (pictured)

Many of the faux apps are littered with bad reviews revealing the games do not work well and crash repeatedly, a telltale sign the download to be a sham (pictured)

It is all part of a wider plan to make money through advertising for the owners of the game or app.

'This adware is capable of displaying full-screen ads, hiding itself, monitoring a device's screen unlocking functionality, and running in the mobile device's background,' warned Trend Micro.

Since the investigative firm reported the findings to Google the search giant 'swiftly suspended the fake apps from the Play Store'.

They are no longer available but users are encouraged to delete and uninstall them off their phone as they are still operational.

Simon Migliano, head of research at Top10VPN.com, says: 'Treating Google as an arbiter of safe content is looking less and less prudent all the time.

'These 85 malware-infected apps could all be downloaded from the Google Play store and would have likely seemed perfectly above board to smartphone users.

'We recently discovered that nine in 10 of the most popular free VPN apps available through Google Play and Apple's App Store have worryingly flimsy privacy policies - leaving their users at serious risk of data harvesting, rather than protecting them as expected.

'Just like these malware-infected apps, these VPNs had been downloaded millions of times too.

'Disconcertingly, Google and Apple still haven't taken any action to remove the VPN apps included in our report - leaving a considerable number of users at risk.

'There's something seriously at odds with Google and Apple's due diligence if they are allowing spurious and even dangerous software onto their app stores - after these latest developments, the veneer of security offered by these companies is increasingly looking gossamer thin.'