Amazon’s fire stick crypto-mining virus: here’s how to check if your device is safe

According to reports, an old crypto-mining virus has been hijacking Amazon Fire TV and Fire TV Stick media streaming devices. This crypto-mining virus significantly slows down the media-streaming device while mining crypto-currency for miners.

The virus was originally designed to target Android-based smart phones for mining crypto currency; however, it is now finding itself at places it was never intended for, i.e. your Amazon Fire TV and Fire TV Stick media streaming devices.

According to the people at XDA Forums, who first identified the issue, you can easily tell if your device has been infected. If your device takes too long to respond or grinds to a halt every now and then, your device may have been infected.

AMAZON’S FIRE TV AND FIRE TV STICK

AFTV News added some details to the crypto-mining virus infection saying, infected devices also displays a pop-up notification with the word “test” next to a green Android robot.

You may be wondering how your device got infected. These viruses come from the unsafe applications from unofficial sources. If you have ever side loaded applications from unknown sources by jail breaking your Fire TV device, that is the source of the infection.

Amazon fire TV Stick

These applications were not meant to be installed on your Fire TV devices in the first place. These applications are from unknown sources and could contain viruses, malware or spyware. You should not install applications from unknown sources.

The Fire TV devices do not allow installing applications from unknown sources. If you want to side load an application on your device, you will have to do it after enabling your device’s developer options under the settings. This restriction is there to protect your device from unknown threats.

The silver lining is, if you have never side loaded an application from unknown source and only used applications from the Amazon Application Store, your device is safe. However, if your device has been infected, you can clean your device by resetting it to factory settings.

This will remove all your account information, applications, data, settings and preferences from your device. Once your reset your device, you will have to setup your device all over again. At the same time though, your device will also get as good as new. For more information contact our Amazon fire stick customer service.