According to a new report from McAfee, when the mobile sensation Flappy Bird was pulled from app stores back in February, scores of cheap knockoffs turned up overnight. McAfee found that 79 percent of all sampled Flappy Bird clones actually contained malware. They tested 300 versions and found that 238 were malicious.

The report notes: "Considering how quickly these malicious apps popped up, and the number of times they have been downloaded, the situation is startling."

The malicious clones did such tasks as make calls without permission, steal contact list data, and track their exact GPS location. Even worse, some versions were able to enable attackers to establish root access for "uninhibited control over anything on the device, including the recording, sending, and receiving of SMS messages."

McAfee also noted that there has been a steep increase in mobile malware - up by by 167 percent during the Q1 2013 and Q1 2014.