Lookout, a mobile security company, is warning Android settlers of a new trojan in the wild that can compromise a significant amount of personal data on a user’s phone and send it to remote servers.
The Lookout blog reports, “A new Trojan affecting Android devices has recently emerged in China. Dubbed ‘Geinimi’ based on its first known incarnation, this Trojan can compromise a significant amount of personal data on a user’s phone and send it to remote servers. The most sophisticated Android malware we’ve seen to date, Geinimi is also the first Android malware in the wild that displays botnet-like capabilities. Once the malware is installed on a user’s phone, it has the potential to receive commands from a remote server that allow the owner of that server to control the phone.”
“Geinimi is effectively being ‘grafted’ onto repackaged versions of legitimate applications, primarily games, and distributed in third-party Chinese Android app markets,” Lookout reports. “The affected applications request extensive permissions over and above the set that is requested by their legitimate original versions. Though the intent of this Trojan isn’t entirely clear, the possibilities for intent range from a malicious ad-network to an attempt to create an Android botnet.”
More info here.
MacDailyNews Take: The Android Tax. Ain’t so-called “open” grand?
Be a smart shopper: Wait a little bit for the Verizon iPhone. Don’t settle for a pale, insecure imitation as if you were a common Windows sufferer.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Jax44” for the heads up.]
Ah. SmugDailyNews.
I guess it’s because hardly anyone has an iPhone that those aren’t being targeted, too.
@bezoar
Nice. I’m guessing the 100+ million iOS user base is obscure enough not to warrant the development time and cost of attacking it.
Security through obscurity! Long live iOS!
Honestly, I don’t understand why this has taken so LONG.
I’m asking: why weren’t there attacks like this on android since day one?
On MDN, “Android settlers” has a whole different meaning.
As one Android user said to other by Skype video, “Hey my butthole is wide open. Wanna stuff a couple of Trojans in there while you’re at it?”
Maybe there were attacks since day one.
Takes time for these attacks to be noticed, then even longer before the media figures out it is worth reporting.
@Dmitri,
This is not the first malware for Android.
Is personal data of Android users actually worth anything?
I’m still waiting for Chrysler to get into the smart phone business.
I can’t wait for them to release their Hemi®-roid.
Bookmarked, printed, emailed to android users I know.. Just to rub it in.
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And I’m still laughing
Man, Android is a hot mess.
I’m wondering when Google gets bored with Android and just pulls the plug on the whole thing. Leaving all the idiots who bought one of those crappy excuses for an iPhone with their you-know-whats swingin’ in the wind.
Hey, Symantec and McAfee. You’re letting me down. Where are your anti-malware apps for Android that “multi-task” in the background and chew up processor cycles. Oh, I see you’re working on it…
http://androinica.com/2010/06/09/norton-security-releases-android-app-for-anti-malware-and-remote-protection/
http://newsroom.mcafee.com/article_display.cfm?article_id=3639