Security News > 2021 > April > iOS Kids Game Morphs into Underground Crypto Casino
A kids' game called "Jungle Run" that, until recently, was available in the Apple App store, was secretly a cryptocurrency-funded casino set up to scam people out of money.
His latest discovery was that Jungle Run, which was marketed in the App Store as a game for ages 4+, transformed into a crypto-funded casino when he set his VPN to Turkey.
He mused on Twitter whether it was available everywhere but the U.S. The same developer also had "Magical Forest Puzzle" on the app store, which used the same VPN trick to unlock a different casino.
After Eleftheriou went to the press with the discovery and Gizmodo was able to verify and report that the Jungle Run app was indeed a shady casino posing as a kiddie game, Apple took the app down.
In order to pass App Review the app claims to be "a fun running game", and in the US works like an extremely basic and very poorly designed kids game.
At the end of March a cache of "Fleecewear" apps, which ultimately took in more than $400 in revenue, were discovered in both Apple and Google's official marketplaces, including "Slime simulators," fortune tellers, filters and other functions largely marketed toward kids.