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If virus scan, booster & cleaner apps are a hoax then why the plethora of great reviews?

Because they flash a little, beep, and then tell people how many viruses they removed, how many unnecessary cache files they removed, or how much memory they freed up preying on the fact that the user believes that these things improve performance. Generally speaking:
  • If you are getting apps from legitimate sources like Play or Amazon it is extremely difficult to get malware but AV detects malicious ad networks that don't have the ability to install malware without your permission
  • Deleting cache files unnecessarily doesn't improve performance in anyway and slows down the apps that judiciously use cache to improve performance.
  • Free memory in Android is wasted memory. Android is designed to load the most used apps into memory so they open faster when you want to use them. Having these apps in memory uses no more power (read: battery) or processing cycles than having the memory empty. "Freeing" the memory only triggers Android to refill it, and what will it fill it with, the apps that keep getting killed to "free" memory because that confuses the learning process of what apps you use frequently. This constant freeing and refilling of memory uses processing power which, tada, uses battery.
  • Couple cleaning cache with apps constantly being closed and reopened, thus rebuilding the app's cache just consumes more processor power and more battery
So what these apps do is prey on the general users' ignorance of how Android works under the hood by providing a short term "fix" that appears to improve performance when in reality the problems it is masking are created by the cleaning itself.
 
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...why the plethora of great reviews?

Shills possibly.

In fact may of them like Cheetah Mobile are worse than hoax, they're data mining you and selling it to third-parties, which is why these thing are "free" of course. They want to know everything you're doing with your phone for $$$. Looks like GO got caught out big time...makers of many "free" apps that have supposed "great reviews".
https://betanews.com/2017/09/21/go-keyboard-spying-warning/
 
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