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Google’s App Defense Alliance will make bad apps easier to spot
July 03, 2025
In 2017, Google launchedGoogle Play Protectwith one simple goal: stop bad apps.
Google Play Protect works by scanning apps daily and adapting over time to find bad code. If it finds a bad actor on one Android device, that’s one more instance for Google’s machine learning system to learn from and prevent the spread of that specific malware across more devices.
The thing is, malicious apps can be incredibly complex. An app doesn’t have to send your data off to a foreign country to do harm. Google categorizes thesepotentially harmful appsunder a number of categories and has been trying to better understand them so Play Protect can catch them early.
But no system is foolproof. Even with Google’s enormous data sets, there will always be malicious apps that slip through the cracks. That’s why today, Google islaunching an initiativecalled the App Defense Alliance, in partnership withESET,Lookout, andZimperium— all top names in the cybersecurity industry.
The App Defense Alliance will integrate systems from all four companies into one major malware-detection platform. Just as everyone thinks differently about solutions to problems, Google thinks adding insight from other industry professionals will help its detection become better, earlier.
Google says it has handpicked these partners due to their track record in finding potential threats. Each of the three partners are consistently cited among analysts in the field, and Google thinks collaboration is key in the cybersecurity industry. “Knowledge sharing and industry collaboration are important aspects in securing the world from attacks. We believe working together is the ultimate way we will get ahead of bad actors,” Kleidermacher said.
Just like theOpen Handset Alliancehelped shape the smartphone industry as we know it today, Google is hoping the new initiative will help create a much safer app ecosystem on Android. For now, it’s not clear if more security companies and researchers will join the new App Defense Alliance in the future. But, as Google put it, when it comes to security, the more eyes the better.
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