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Other people are remotely controlling my phone. How do I stop them and get my life back?

Sometimes I will see the screen being navigated when I am not even touching the phone. Swiping motions, back button presses and menu selections happening automatically without my finger even touching the phone or my voice interacting with Google Assistant.

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  • What do you mean by remotely controlling? Please clarify what is happening
    – esQmo_
    Jun 4, 2018 at 8:25
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    Could you add detail such as : your phone model, is it rooted, and what software have you installed recently? It's hard to make a specific answer without these details.
    – Zackary
    Jun 4, 2018 at 19:30
  • @esQmo_ sometimes my screen is being navigated by somebody else's finger. Maybe it's a ghost that I don't see in front of my face? Probably not. Most likely somebody else is navigating through my phone remotely.
    – Eeshwar Das
    Jun 6, 2018 at 0:33
  • @Zackary we are using the Moto E4. The updates are current. We are only using apps that came with the phone and a few other big-name apps that are very common. The phone is not rooted, was purchased directly from Verizon and has been on the same Verizon service the whole time. The phone came with Android 7.1.1 and it is still running Android 7.1.1 with Motorola updates.
    – Eeshwar Das
    Jun 6, 2018 at 0:37
  • Are they doing specific actions? (I mean those you think are hacking yout device), such as accessing your infos: SMS, call history, social networks activities... Or the "touch" seems randomly? Eg an area being touched whatever screen you are at at the moment?
    – esQmo_
    Jun 8, 2018 at 22:24

3 Answers 3

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It's a really broad question but this could solve any remote control issues.

  1. (try this method first):

    • Force power off your phone (hold down the power button until the screen does black)
    • Turn off your Wi-Fi, and remove any SIM cards.
    • Power on the phone.
    • Look in the Downloaded folder for any suspicious software (such as com.google.daemon or "Service of Google Play") and remove it (if there is only an "Uninstall updates" button, then it is real system software).
    • Power it off, turn on your Wi-Fi, insert your SIM card(s), and tun it back on.

  2. (only try if #1 didn't work):

    • Turn your phone off, and put it in recovery mode (can't say exactly how without your phone model). Navigate to wipe data/factory reset > Yes - erase all data (WARNING: you will lose all data on the phone).
    • Turn it back on. It should be fixed unless the R.A.T (stands for Remote Administration Tool or Remote Access Trojan) is a system app.
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  • Yes, we have done some things like you have suggested
    – Eeshwar Das
    Jul 4, 2018 at 18:06
  • There is some DM apps on the phone by default. Also some strange VPN apps. We have tried to disable them, but the list of 150 unusual apps is so long and convoluded that we havn't been able to solve the issue. We don't have the R.A.T. but there are various other apps that may be producing similar results.
    – Eeshwar Das
    Jul 4, 2018 at 18:08
  • What we have done to some success is remove our account from the android phone and stop using many apps that have more advanced functionality. We have seen some success at being able to make and receive phones calls a little better. We are getting text messages sent from us and to us that we never wrote and the other person never wrote.
    – Eeshwar Das
    Jul 4, 2018 at 18:13
  • @EeshwarDas You could root your device and install an app that can remove system apps (like Titanium Backup) to remove those apps. Be careful what you remove, though - system-independent apps are OK to remove, but system apps could soft-brick your phone (it can be recovered from that, but it requires the stock ROM and an understanding of fastboot).
    – Zackary
    Jul 5, 2018 at 0:01
  • Hey Zackary, the at function is not letting me shout to you. Maybe something wrong with Stack Exchange in my region. Yes, I could root the device, but my understanding of being an Android Device Admin is not sufficient enough to get past this significant amount of Malware on my first try rooting a device. I would definitely ruin the device if I did what you say. It would be possible to learn, but I don't have the time or the money. There are many apps posing as system apps that are clearly not system apps, so it would take an Android surgeon to be able to fix this device.
    – Eeshwar Das
    Jul 8, 2018 at 19:50
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Download an app calldd 0permission and verify your kernel module is correct.

Exposing a bootloaderand rooting is in the past.

People like to expose your initrd (initial ramdisk) and backdoor their shell command off that

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  • user332372, why a new app? Shouldn't Google simply prevent this issue without any need for third party apps?
    – Eeshwar Das
    Oct 30, 2020 at 17:22
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these ghost touches are a well known hardware failure of touch screen. replace the digitizer or whole screen

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  • androidpit.com/…
    – alecxs
    Dec 4, 2019 at 16:52
  • alecxs, good suggestion, but in my case I have seen enough proof that this issue was due to malware. The hardware worked very good on my device.
    – Eeshwar Das
    Oct 30, 2020 at 17:18

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