Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Hacked smartphones can be used to spy on you

Smartphones, the one-in-all gadget that has taken the technology world by storm, can be hacked easily and made to reveal not only users’ personal information but their location too.

Today’s smartphones are really just mobile computers. Many of them run the same class of operating systems as desktop and laptop computers, and as a result are just as vulnerable to malware attacks, researches say. “Smartphones are essentially becoming regular computers,” said Vinod Ganapathy, assistant professor of computer science at the Rutgers University School of Arts and Sciences.

Researchers, led by Ganapathy and Liviu Iftode, Rutgers’ professor, demonstrated how such a software attack could cause a smart phone to eavesdrop on a meeting, track its owner’s location, or rapidly drain its battery to render the phone useless.

In fact, vulnerabilities in smartphones are even more dangerous because people carry them around at all times, making it easier for attackers to eavesdrop. These actions could happen without the owner being aware of what happened or what caused them.

Source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/science/Hacked-smartphones-can-be-used-to-spy-on-you/articleshow/5609179.cms

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