Virus on Smartphones

[Guest djfuego]

It's a bit of a niggly annoyance that sits in the back of my mind when I think about viruses in general and I've recently read about 64bit windows virus.

There was a big scare early on with PDA based software and trojans. so I was thinking.. how come I haven't heard about anyone writing some sort of trojan or virus for smartphones?

I mean think of all that info on your phone. All you have to do is sync with your pc and it could be infected.

In todays age AV, firewall and spyware software is mandatory. If you don't have protection then your windows machine is pretty open to anyone if it's on the net.

Am i the only one that spares a though to the nasty little virus writing people out there?

owne1.gif

[Guest chucky.egg]

There was a "virus" (Cabir, I think) written for Symbian Series 60 which... well it just says "Cabir". Odd, but hey.

It was never found in the wild, and could only spread by Bluetooth, and only then when the receipient choose to accept the transfer, and then accept the installation. Thay may have something to do with it never being found in the wild.

It was supposed to prove the concept, but it did inspire a company to produce AV software for Symbian phones. They've so far conned 150+ people out of £13 each.

http://www.handango.com/uk/PlatformProduct...roductId=127963

[Guest Palindrome]

I agree, the amount of information on our phones would be rich pickings. Already we've had that incident, although not virus based, with hidden SMS sending to premium numbers that shows in part what could happen if a virus could get round Smartphone security measures.

Simple common sense precautions will go a long way to help stop any future virii/worms from infecting and as soon as the first ones are detected I'm sure the developers will get on the case with software protection. There's safety in numbers and MoDaCo certainly has that.

[Guest djfuego]

I'm just amazed how long the Smartphone has lasted without someone writing a real stinker of a virus or a trojan for it. I guess MS have surpassed themself on the security.

[Guest chucky.egg]

Er, I would think it's probably because there just aren't enough MS Smartphones around yet to make it worth while.

If MS have finally got security licked I'll eat my hat

[Guest maxh2003]

just aren't enough MS Smartphones around yet

Hit the nail on the head there. Viruses need to propagate to survive. How is a Smartphone virus going to propagate?

Random IP addresses? Not much chance of a Smartphone user being found.

Bluetooth - even less likely you'd walk past another Smartphone user at the right moment.

Transfer via phone network, using numbers out of the address book, is the most likely route IMO. Such a virus would die pretty quickly, but if it got into one MoDaCo user's phone, it might find lots of other MoDaCo users that way.

Trojans are more of a risk atm, I reckon. You've got much more chance ot trashing your phone via some dodgy Usenet download, than you have of catching a virus via some explot or other.

[Guest ptootill]

I do worry about viruses - maybe it's unlikely but is there any reason why a virus couldn't be transmitted to a smartphone by email (and even to/from a PC during a sync)?

Rgrds

Peter

[Guest awarner [MVP]]

One reason for application locking is to help protect the phone.

[Guest midnight]

exactly, even with the 'slackened' security in windows mobile 2003, the OS still asks if you want to install any software, there is no way around this (well, kinda ^_^)

[Guest MrTunney]

Windows Mobile makes up about 0.1% of all mobile phones (4% of smartphones). I'm sure there's lots of vulnerabilities in it but is it worth the bother, when it's easier to write one for the desktop version of Windows?