Nokia Phone Gets Virus Protection

wan-fu writes "After all that talk about bluetooth vulnerabilities and mobile phone virii there will finally be a mobile phone with virus protection. Nokia's 6670 smart phone will be released in October and features software from F-Secure. Perhaps this will raise the eyebrows of some other mobile phone manufacturers to step up and increase their security policies for their phones' operating systems."

Comments

Hmm

[pHatidic]

Am I missing something here?

Why not just make a phone that is secure in the first place and can't get viruses. This has to be the worst marketing ploy ever.

Re:Hmm

[pyrros]

>Why not just make a phone that is secure in the first place and
>can't get viruses. This has to be the worst marketing ploy ever.

Because people want more and more features. Series 60 phones from nokia can run user-installed programs, and we all know what happens when you mix ease of installation (browse to a WAP/web page) and clueless users.

Still, the right aproach would be educating users and using some kind of sandbox model:

"pr0napplet wants to make a phone call"
[Allow] [Deny] [Always] [Never]

But I completely agree that bundling snakeoil is NOT the way to go. Moving the antivirus arms race to mobile phones will only hurt the phone market in the long run: when your PC gets 0wned, most of the time you just lose the use of your bandwidth: the spam you send does not immediately hurt you. Should your phone get 0wned, you'll probaly run a service bill in the thousands of dollars (or euros). Once word gets out, some people will be too scared to use a smartphone.

Re:Hmm

[Taladar]

Because people want more and more features.

Marketing people want people to believe they want more features.

I just want ...

[Homology]

a mobile telephone that is just that : a telephone. And I most certainly don't need a mobile telephone whose OS is so insecure that it needs an anti-virus program.

Re:I just want ...

[Vicsun]

...then buy a telephone which is just a telephone. Those who want more bells&whistles will get a phone with more bells&whistles.
I never got while people complained about today's phones being too complex; older phones, which are just that - phones, can still be purchased and can be purchased at a price lower than a 'new' phones can.

Re:I just want ...

[EvilNTUser]

Goddamnit, stop modding these posts up. They're about as insightful as saying that a computer should just be a calculator.

Good!

[commodoresloat]

The first time I get a phone call that says "Hi! How are you? I call you in order to have your advice! See you later! Thanks," I think I will kill someone.

A solution looking for a problem

[leathered]

Good score for the marketing people. Buy our phones and get protection against those nasty viruses. Right now the chances of your phone getting infected are practically nil, and most phone viruses have been demonstrated by AV firms themselves to help seed a market for them in the future.

Anti-Virus

[whiteranger99x]

Well, as long as I don't have to sacrifice my Britney Spears ringtones, it's ok with me...

Wait, I didn't mean Britney Spears ringtones, I meant Slayer ringtones! Yeah, rock the fuck on dudes!!!!

Re:Same old problem

[invisik]

I think dial-up internet users have trouble keeping their def's up to date, yes. Broadband users, however, typically leave their computer on all the time, so the automatic updating usually works. Norton Antivirus has gotten a lot smarter in catching the latest defs when it can, not on a set schedule anymore.

Will anyone update their phone? Hopefully it has automatic updates that "just run" when the phone is on and idle. Of course, that has yet to be seen.

Overall, I agree with the others--a phone should be secure enough from the get-go to not need all this overhead.

-m

I'd rather see Nokia patch the OS

[tero]

The article states that there's nothing in the phone that makes it particularly susceptible to viruses and that Nokia knows of no capabilities within any of its devices that a virus might exploit. Fair enough, I suppose, but what happens when one day they release a version which has a bug in it.

The AV software subscription seems to be an monthly based fee type thingy. (Hats off to F-Secure, looks like they're right there on the bleeding edge of squeezing money out of everything).

What I'd really like to see is Nokia (and other manufacturers) taking their responsibility and offering online (or SMS based) free updates to their OS.

I don't want to be forced to subscribing into some monthly fee based bloodsucking anti-virus scheme just to be able to use my phone without having to worry about viruses turning my phone into SMS spamming zombie.

Even Microsoft releases patches every now and then, why not Nokia (and other cell phone manufacturers)?

Re:I just want ... a multitude of devices

[Judge_Fire]

"a mobile telephone that is just that : a telephone. "

Yeah and cars are cars and planes are planes. No place for CD players, clocks, complex error prone computer systems and whatnot.

Telephony is just a feature and I can't see any particular reason why it should deserve a dedicated box.

I don't particularly want to carry a multitude of individual plastic/metal containers for each feature that I may need daily, such as a calculator, clock, camera, calendar etc.

So perhaps these damn thingies, phones, PDAs, laptops etc. should be called something new and neutral. Any ideas?

J

Re:Cool...Sorta

[Deliveranc3]

Since all phone trafic travels through their networks and all software is propreietary there is no reason for viruses to be able to spread.

Analysing and removing the packages that contain virus data could be done on the server level much more easily than at the client level, also by charging for the service they are allowing users with phones that don't have virus protection to become infected and increasing the threat of infection to their other users.

Basically they are screwing everyone in order to eventually offer virus support.