Belgian Public Radio 2 Interview about Mobile Virus
On February 1st, the Belgian public radio “Radio 2” interviewed LSEC during the program Inspecteur Decaluw, following a listener’s concern about a virus on a digital photo camera.
The first mobile virus (a virus on a mobile phone) was discovered in 2004. By 2008 the total number of discovered mobile virus signatures was about 400. During 2009, the total number was estimated approximately 600. A very small number in comparison with the more than 25 million signatures of Malware for pc’s, but still taking into consideration the total number of smartphones available in the world, quite many.
In principle, the mobile Internet provider (your cell phone company) should be able to protect its users from malware going around, since they are taking care of the network. Unfortunately some viruses could still enter your smartphone. Typically, the most attacked phones are phones such as Nokia, LG, Samsung, ... running on either Symbian or Windows Mobile operating systems. They are most widely spread amongst all cell phones world wide. Up until now only 1 virus has been detected for Blackberry smart phones. No figures have been known for Apple’s Iphone or Google’s Nexus One.
It is important to watch out for SMS’es with hyperlinks to websites that download virusses to your cell phone.
These can sometimes send premium SMS’es without you knowing, resulting in a monthly higher phone bill.
Other virusses have been known to hijack one’s phone with the virus software, until the owner paid a certain amount of money for the phone to be released.
More common are spyware’s that can either follow the user’s transactions, wherabouts (with the phone GPS capabilities), record conversations or even send pictures and video’s.
To listen to the interview at Radio 2 Inspecteur Decaluwé.
For more information on the protection against mobile virusses, please visit our Members F-Secure and McAfee.
By Ulrich Seldeslachts
01-Feb-2010
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