Adam Powers, the CTO of network security and monitoring firm Lancope, also thinks that end users need to be vigilant to avoid getting malware installed on their devices. In particular, he recommends not installing an application unless it's been downloaded more than 10,000 times and has received at least 100 reviews and comments from users on the Android Market. And like Nguyen, he says that users really need to read through an application's requested permissions before installing it.

"An excellent example of a suspicious app ... is 'Binary Calculator' by author 'John Anderson,'" he explains. "This app showed up on the Android Marketplace today ... has zero reviews and less than 50 downloads. The app's feature description is poorly written and just screams of potential malware. Why would a binary calculator app need to modify or delete SD card contents? Why would this app need to read or write contact data? This app asks for far more permissions than it needs and should be avoided."

in Network World's Anti-malware section.