And thus it begins, the era of SMS viruses for Android. That’s according to security firm Kaspersky, which earlier this week warned that the first malicious program classified as a Trojan-SMS has been detected for smartphones built around Google’s Android platform.
“The new malicious program penetrates smartphones running Android in the guise of a harmless media player application,” Kaspersky warns. “Users are prompted to install a file of just over 13KB with the standard Android extension .APK. Once installed on the phone, the Trojan uses the system to begin sending SMSs to premium rate numbers without the owner’s knowledge or consent, resulting in money passing from a user’s account to that of the cybercriminals.”
Called Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer, Kaspersky says this bit of mischievous (and costly) code has already infected a number of mobile devices. That isn’t surprising, considering that the Trojan-SMS category is the most widespread class of malware for mobile phones, Kaspersky claims.
More here.
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