News of an iPod virus from Kaspersky Labs
The first “proof of concept” virus on the iPod was discovered by Anti-Virus vendor Kaspersky Labs. “Proof of concept” viruses pose no real threat to the market and cannot be spread in their current form. But, if those with mal intentions get their hands on it, how long before a virus can be spread through podcasts or even MP3 files themselves?
Of course, iPods have been infected with a virus before with those shipping from the factory with a virus that could infect a Windows XP system but the virus did not affect the iPod itself.
This new virus does not infect the native operating system of the iPod. It must have been replaced with iPod Linux which does not run on current generation iPods. Installing iPod Linux also disables playback of any music downloaded from the iTunes Store and it will no longer sync with iTunes.
When the file containing the virus is downloaded to the iPod and launched by playing the infected file it scans the iPod for all executable and linking files and infects them. For now all that happens is a screen with the message “You are infected with Oslo the first iPodLinux Virus,” is displayed.
The virus seems to be limited to data files not of the music or video variety for now. It is believed this type of attack will not be seen in the wild for quite some time but it’s out there and it’s just getting started.
This iPod virus isn’t too dangerous because it’s a proof of concept that doesn’t even run on the iPods native operating system but it does prove that iPods can be infected and it can pose a threat. This type of attack doesn’t really represent any type of gain for the person perpetrating it, that’s not to say it won’t in the future. I’m taking bets on which company produces the first anti-virus program for use on your iPod.
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