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Security researchers have found a new tool targeting users of jailbroken iPhones.
On the heels of the discovery of a worm targeting jailbroken iPhones in Australia, security researchers at Intego now say they have detected a program known as iPhone/Privacy.A that hackers can use to swipe personal data.
The program does not get installed on the iPhone, but instead is a tool a hacker can install on any computer running Mac OS X, Windows, Linux or Unix. An attacker can use it to scan a wireless network for jailbroken iPhones and then exploit the same default SSH password issue leveraged by the ikee worm.
“When connecting to a jailbroken iPhone, this tool allows a hacker to silently copy a treasure trove of user data from a compromised iPhone: e-mail, contacts, SMSs, calendars, photos, music files, videos, as well as any data recorded by any iPhone app,” according to the Intego advisory. “Unlike the ikee worm, which signals its presence by changing the iPhone’s wallpaper, this hacker tool gives no indication that it has invaded an iPhone.”
Unlike the ikee worm, which announced itself by changing the wallpaper once it was installed, this new tool does nothing to indicate to the iPhone user that their device has been compromised, Intego warns.
“While it is not possible to protect the iPhone from this hacker tool – it does not install anything on an iPhone – VirusBarrier X5 can ensure that Macs, especially in businesses, are protected from this hacker tool being installed,” according to Intego. “We would like to stress that users who jailbreak their iPhones are exposing themselves to known vulnerabilities that are being exploited by code that is circulating in the wild.”
However, the easy solution to this for those who want to jailbreak their iPhones is to change their root password. Instructions on how to do that can be found here.
“The advice is loud and clear: if you jailbreak your iPhone, don’t leave the default root password as “alpine” or you’re asking for trouble,” Graham Clulely, senior technology consultant at Sophos, told eWEEK.