Android Rootkit Is Just a Phone Call Away

alphadogg writes "Hoping to understand what a new generation of mobile malware could resemble, security researchers will demonstrate a malicious 'rootkit' program they've written for Google's Android phone next month at the Defcon hacking conference in Las Vegas. Once it's installed on the Android phone, the rootkit can be activated via a phone call or SMS message, giving attackers a stealthy and hard-to-detect tool for siphoning data from the phone or misdirecting the user. 'You call the phone, the phone doesn't ring, and when the phone realizes that it's being called by an attacker's phone number, it sends him back a shell [program],' said Christian Papathanasiou, a security consultant with Chicago's Trustwave, the company that did the research."

Comments

just like installing a trojan on your computer!

[Anonymous Coward]

...which could let the hacker get access.

I am an Android developer--- and this article is fail. If a user just installs whatever app--- giving it whatever permissions to their phone.. how is this any different from a stupid user installing an app on their PC/MAC that has a trojan built in?

And the ability to "listen" for a call is called a BroadcastReceiver. It's nothing special or hackish. Think a trigger ruleset for Android like you have for your mail client.

Good god.

Wow this article makes it so scary

[Technomancer]

From TFA: "The rootkit could also track a victim's location or even reroute his browser to a malicious Web site."
Really? And then what? The malicious website will install another worse rootkit?
It has rootkit! The phone is compromised, all the information you have on it is potentially leaked and the phone doesn't belong to your carrier anymore (it never belonged to you, you realize that, right?) it belongs to the rootkit operator. The only cure is to either flash it with fresh OS or burn it with fire.