A strange lockscreen just appeared on my S8

[Dr Bonz]

Yesterday 1/12/19 a strange lockscreen just appeared on my S8. I did not download any new apps and have received no new updates. Everything else seems fine. I downloaded Malwarebytes and ran a scan and it found nothing.

If you swipe right it goes away and if you swipe left another ad screen is there.

I have screen shots of both of these but I’m not sure how to post them.

I did a search here and someone mentioned searching through apps to see which ones have lockscreen permissions but I’m not sure how to do that.

I would appreciate any help on getting rid of this really annoying unwelcomed junk. Thanks!

 

[Javier P]

See if this guide helps you to find the culprit.

https://forums.androidcentral.com/showthread.php?t=901497

 

[Dr Bonz]

 

[Dr Bonz]

The above is the screen in question. The pic in the background is my normal ho,screen picture. The Hot Apps icon if pressed gives me an ad. If you press the contacts icon, I get my real contact screen. If I press the camera icon, I get my camera. If I press the clean icon, it runs this (probably fake) cleaning thing that lasts about 3 seconds (I do not have this app on my phone).

The phone battery power and time it shows are always the same and are not correct.

 

[Dr Bonz]

If I swipe right it unlocks to my regular home screen. If I swipe left I get this....

 

[Javier P]

That's definitely caused by an app that you downloaded. In the guide I linked above there are some possible solutions to identify the culprit.

 

[Dr Bonz]

Ha! Found the culprit! Thanks Javiar. Enabled developer mode which allowed me to see current running apps. They all looked like normal system apps except SMART SCAN which was hogging 450 MB of RAM. I went to apps and then to Smart Scan and cleared its cache, then cleared all it’s data, then uninstalled. No more annoying lock screen!

“Smart Scan” is the app that allows you to scan those square black and white bar codes called QR (quick response) codes with your phone’s camera just so others know about it.

Thanks again!

Funny thing is, I’ve had this app on my phone for over a year and this just happened yesterday.

 

[Javier P]

Excellent! Glad it helped and thanks for the follow up. It will be very helpful for other users with a similar problem.

 

[arayshow]

Thank you so much, I just remotely helped my cousin fix this exact problem by using developer mode to find the culprit app, and then clearing/uninstalling as above. She is calling me a tech wizard, I said you guys get all the credit!

 

[Javier P]

Thank you so much, I just remotely helped my cousin fix this exact problem by using developer mode to find the culprit app, and then clearing/uninstalling as above. She is calling me a tech wizard, I said you guys get all the credit!

Haha. Nice! Glad it helped and thanks for the follow up.

 

[Ben Kleinman]

Same issue, same problem app, same solution.
Thanks!