December 27, 2004

Mobile Viruses: should you be concerned?

Now that your current or your next mobile phone has an operating system, files, email and functions like PC you SHOULD be concerned about mobile viruses.

Sure, mobile viruses are not going to be as prevalent as it would be on a PC but the threat will rise. There's two threats:

1. The threat of a virus destroying/stealing your mobile data
2. The threat of that virus jumping to your networking.

The Seattle Post Intelligencer writes Malicious programs that can delete address books. Junk messages that flood a cell phone's inbox. Stealthy code that uses Bluetooth wireless technology to sneak onto handsets.

Scared yet? Security experts say plagues like these will target mobile phones, but others contend cell phone viruses are the tech equivalent of smallpox: To the best of anyone's knowledge, they exist only in labs.

"We've had no reports of people actually seeing these viruses in their daily use," said Graham Cluley, a senior technology consultant with London's Sophos PLC. "The only reports we've seen documented are antivirus researchers sending them to each other in their labs."

Japanese phone company NTT DoCoMo already sells phones with built-in antivirus software from McAfee Inc., and McAfee expects similar phones to be available in the United States and Europe in 2005.

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