Security News > 2011 > January > Soundminer Android Malware Listens, Then Steals, Phone Data

http://www.csoonline.com/article/656264/soundminer-android-malware-listens-then-steals-phone-data By Jeremy Kirk IDG News Service January 20, 2011 Researchers have developed a low-profile Trojan horse program for Google's Android mobile OS that steals data in a way that is unlikely to be detected by either a user or antivirus software. The malware, called Soundminer, monitors phone calls and records when a person, for example, says their credit card number or enters one on the phone's keypad, according to the study. Using various analysis techniques, Soundminer trims the extraneous recorded information down to the most essential, such as the credit card number itself, and sends just that small bit of information back to the attacker over the network, the researchers said. The study was done by Roman Schlegel of City University of Hong Kong and Kehuan Zhang, Xiaoyong Zhou, Mehool Intwala, Apu Kapadia, XiaoFeng Wang of Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. "We implemented Soundminer on an Android phone and evaluated our technique using realistic phone conversation data," they wrote. "Our study shows that an individual's credit card number can be reliably identified and stealthily disclosed. Therefore, the threat of such an attack is real." [...] ___________________________________________________________ Tegatai Managed Colocation: Four Provider Blended Tier-1 Bandwidth, Fortinet Universal Threat Management, Natural Disaster Avoidance, Always-On Power Delivery Network, Cisco Switches, SAS 70 Type II Datacenter. Find peace of mind, Defend your Critical Infrastructure. http://www.tegataiphoenix.com/

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http://www.csoonline.com/article/656264/soundminer-android-malware-listens-then-steals-phone-data