Rick Astley Image Eats up Jailbroken iPhones in Australia
A number of owners of Jailbroken Apple iPhones in Australia have reportedly complained of a worm that’s been invading their units, thereby affecting the dedicated servers embedded in the system. According to reports, an image of eighties pop icon Rick Astley has been seen replacing the wallpapers in the phone.
The incidents have been shared online although there haven’t been official developments stated in relation to this matter.
The hacker, identified as 21-year old Ashley Towns, claimed responsibility in this incident. Using an online username “ikex,” Towns claimed that more than a hundred iPhones have been infected with the malware. With the capability to share files using the units, there’s a big possibility that the numbers of phones infected with the virus will rise since unsuspecting users will no doubt continue sharing files, photos and others.
SophosLabs is currently analyzing the virus code. Programmers discovered that it has the capability of hiding its presence through a file path similar to Cydia jailbreaking tool.
Users who weren’t able to change the default password after installing Secure Shell (SSH) are vulnerable to the hack. The best thing to do is to change the root password first before doing any installation.
This development has garnered interest because according to Sophos Senior Security officer for Relevant Products and Services Graham Cluley, this is the first worm to ever spread between iPhone units. He stressed that this is a dangerous form of malware and there’s more than just an image of Rick Astley in terms of its effects.
