Samsung Phone Embraces Mobile Phone Vaccine
Samsung Electronics, the world’s third-largest cell phone producer, plans to offer an anti-mobile virus solution to users of its new model, the SPH-M4500.
AhnLab, Korea’s primary online security company, yesterday said it will provide software to detect mobile viruses and cure them to the Seoul-based Samsung.
The software will be incorporated into a compact disk, which users of the SPH-M4500 will automatically obtain free of charge, at Samsung sales outlets.
They need to install the program at a personal computer before connecting their cell phone to the machine to scan viruses and kill them.
“We have yet to receive any reports on mobile viruses in Korea but they will be sure to start to sprout up in the near future,’’ AhnLab senior researcher Kang Eun-sung said.
“This is the first step to contain them. The market for anti-mobile viruses will continue to grow at a fast pace,’’ Kang added.
Cell phones have been recognized as being safe from viruses but this belief proved to be wrong in 2004 when a proof-of-concept program, called Cabir, caused problems in Europe and the United States.
Korea avoided Cabir because the mobile headache attacked cell phones incorporated with a Symbian operating system, mainly adopted by Nokia, the world’s foremost cell phone vendor.
Korea, which embrace an alternative Java operating system, was not affected by Cabir but earlier this year a mobile virus that attacks Java system was also found.