The tech giant removes 164 more offending Android apps after banning software showing this type of behavior from the store last year.

Google has removed 164 apps, downloaded a total of 10 million times, from its Google Play marketplace because they were delivering “disruptive” ads, considered malicious.

Last year, the tech giant banned apps that delivered this type of advertising, called out-of-context ads. But the problem continues to plague Google despite numerous efforts by the company to prevent “malicious developers” from submitting their apps to its Google Play marketplace.

Researchers discovered the offending apps mimicking legitimate apps to garner downloads, “only to then trick the user into seeing a whole bunch of unexpected ads,” researchers Gabi Cirlig, Michael Gethers, Lisa Gansky and Adam Sell wrote in a report published by WhiteOps Satori Threat Intelligence Team.

WhiteOps identified the 164 apps, calling them CopyCatz apps, because bulk of those identified attempted to mimic the functions of other popular apps – and spewed the obnoxious ads.