He's out of line, but he's right

Not that I trust Google, but this screams of "no, u!"

Does anyone trust what Huawei says?

The same happens to Chinese app stores on Android phones. Just companies trying to throw up obstacles for their competition.

Between this and antivirus software flagging cracked software, I wish security apps would focus on security instead of weaponizing consumer trust.

I mean, it is malicious if you think about all the permissions it had. Not saying that Huawei isn't spying on you too.

It's sooo much easier to exfiltrate data over the internet. Why would any virus use short messages?

~~Smartphone software~~ most software these days only attempts to prevent unauthorized access to your information. It's up to the manufacturer to determine who is and isn't authorized. Calling that behavior malicious or not is moot point because they all do it.

Viruses spread themselves, this is more of an infection

9to5mac is a super weird source for something like this. I mean, they wear their boas in their name!