Cell phone virus tries leaping to PCs

Iria · Sep 22, 2005, 08:35 PM

A Trojan virus that attempts to spread from smart phones to users' PCs was discovered Wednesday, marking one of the first cases of virus "cross-sharing" between the two devices, according to security firm F-Secure.

Cardtrap.A, a Trojan that attacks Symbian mobile phone operating systems, attempts to infect users' PCs if they insert the phone's memory card into their computers. Although this latest threat is considered low-level because it requires user interaction and fails to launch on a number of Windows systems, including XP, it may be a precursor to more sophisticated viruses designed for transfer between mobile devices and PCs, said Mikko Hypponen, F-Secure chief research officer.

"We expect to see more of this on the mobile front," Hypponen said. "We may begin see Windows viruses spreading to PDAs that are synched up to computers, or go from PCs to mobile phones with the memory card."

Cardtrap.A copies two worms, Win32/Padobot.Z and Win32/Rays, to a phone's memory card. Once that card is inserted into the PC, Padobot.Z will attempt to start automatically on Windows-based machines via the autorun.inf file. The Ray worm, meanwhile, will create a bogus system folder on the user's desktop. Clicking on the folder unleashes a worm into the user's computer system.
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Read More / Source: News.com

Sep 22, 2005, 08:35 PM	#1
Iria DriverHeaven Extreme Member Join Date: Apr 2004 Posts: 7,275 Rep Power: 89	Cell phone virus tries leaping to PCs A Trojan virus that attempts to spread from smart phones to users' PCs was discovered Wednesday, marking one of the first cases of virus "cross-sharing" between the two devices, according to security firm F-Secure. Cardtrap.A, a Trojan that attacks Symbian mobile phone operating systems, attempts to infect users' PCs if they insert the phone's memory card into their computers. Although this latest threat is considered low-level because it requires user interaction and fails to launch on a number of Windows systems, including XP, it may be a precursor to more sophisticated viruses designed for transfer between mobile devices and PCs, said Mikko Hypponen, F-Secure chief research officer. "We expect to see more of this on the mobile front," Hypponen said. "We may begin see Windows viruses spreading to PDAs that are synched up to computers, or go from PCs to mobile phones with the memory card." Cardtrap.A copies two worms, Win32/Padobot.Z and Win32/Rays, to a phone's memory card. Once that card is inserted into the PC, Padobot.Z will attempt to start automatically on Windows-based machines via the autorun.inf file. The Ray worm, meanwhile, will create a bogus system folder on the user's desktop. Clicking on the folder unleashes a worm into the user's computer system. __________ Read More / Source: News.com