• On mySimon: Pea Coats Are Another Wardrobe Staple
January 22, 2008 7:39 AM PST

Beselo Symbian worm making the rounds

by Dawn Kawamoto

Hello, hello. It's me, the Beselo worm calling, and, man, do I have a new trick for your Symbian-based phone.

But security researchers are advising users of the Symbian S60 second-edition phones to just hang up.

(Credit: F-Secure)

The Beselo.A and Beselo.B worms are in the wild, looking to lure Symbian S60 users into clicking on their incoming malicious files, according to a warning issued Tuesday by F-Secure.

The Beselo worms are tricky, in that they use common media file extensions, rather than a standard SIS extension, in sending their malicious payload.

Like the Commwarrior worms, the Beselo worms rely on MMS and Bluetooth to get around, with some social engineering thrown in to trick users into installing the SIS application installation file. But because this file has a common media file extension, such as beauty.jpg, sex.mp3, or love.rm, users are more likely to click "yes" to an installation prompt when opening the file, notes F-Secure.

F-Secure offers this word of advice: just say "no" to such a request.

"There is no reason for any image file to ask installation questions on the Symbian platform, so any image or sound file that does something else than play immediately is without question something else than it claims to be," warns F-Secure.

That's the latest twist on smart-phone worms, which debuted in 2004 with the arrival of the Cabir worm. The Beselo worms, meanwhile, were initially clumped in with the pervasive Commwarrior worms, until a discovery was made about their use of common media file extensions.

Dawn Kawamoto covers enterprise security and financial news relating to technology for CNET News. E-mail Dawn.
Recent posts from News Blog
Nvidia puts NForce chipset development on hold
Opera 10 browser is here
Neil Young Archives Blu-ray: Rip off?
Acronis revises survey results about backup habits
Acronis miscalculates data on users' bad backup habits
Flickr co-founder presses beta button
Comcast, Sony open retail store
Cox to try coaxing the Internet into submission
Add a Comment (Log in or register)
Only impacts 2nd Edition
by ericn80 January 23, 2008 10:27 AM PST
For more detail you can read this:

http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/news/item/6596_New_worm_targets_S60_2nd_Editi.php
Reply to this comment
advertisement

FAQ: Buying the right Windows 7 upgrade

Readers still have lots of questions on just which version of the software they need to buy in order to upgrade their PC. CNET News tries to offer some answers.

N.Y. lawsuit details Intel's 'largesse' toward Dell

Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's federal antitrust case filed Wednesday alleges a longstanding symbiotic relationship between Intel and Dell.

About News Blog

Recent posts on technology, trends, and more.

Add this feed to your online news reader

advertisement
advertisement

Inside CNET News

Scroll Left Scroll Right