CELL PHONE HACKED?

[Shatnerswig Profile]

does anyone here know if you can hack a cell phone ? the reason i ask is that my phone has been sending and recieving data on its own....at odd hours late at night =early morning. no one uses this phone but me and I'm not sending or recieving data at these times.... any insight would be appreciated

[Rar1981 Profile]

heres what yahoo says.
IBM, McAfee and Symantec say cell phones can be broken into, but it would take a sophisticated hacker.
By Ellen Messmer , NetworkWorld.com , 06/25/2007
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A Tacoma, Wash., family claims the cell phones it uses have been taken over by hackers, who are turning them on at will, capturing conversations and manipulating the cell phone camera.

The story of the Kuykendall family, as reported in the Tacoma News Tribune last week, seems an unlikely one. They believe their cell phones, as well as those owned by other families, have been taken over and the cell-phones' cameras mysteriously turn on and off. While the mystery of the Kuykendall family’s cell-phone experience hasn't been fully explained, people are wondering whether such an event is even possible. Security experts say yes — but it's still in the realm of the unlikely.
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Security experts from IBM, McAfee and Symantec agree that virtually any type of cell phone can be broken into and maliciously controlled, though that takes a high degree of sophistication.

“It’s definitely possible, but still something that is limited to a very sophisticated attacker,” says Neel Mehta, team lead in the advanced research group at IBM’s Internet Security Systems Division.

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Mehta says malicious code to take over the phone could be sent to the intended victim in the guise of a picture or audio clip. Once the victim clicked on it, the malware would be installed. Many in the industry refer to this as “snoopware.”

A cell-phone hijacking that enables the attacker to manipulate the microphone and camera remains “a very rare occurrence in the field,” says Paul Miller, managing director of mobile security at Symantec.

However, Miller notes that J2EE-styled malware is known to exist, for example, the “Red Browser” for sending Short Message Service messages, which is believed to have originated in Russia. Such malware typically has been used to defraud the victim, particularly in Europe. The number of viruses targeting smart phones and feature-based cell phones remains low, in the mobile realm, roughly one for every 500 viruses targeting PCs, he adds.

There are "spouse-monitoring tools” that can be obtained on the Internet to snoop on phone use, and some pure hacker varieties of this are starting to appear as well, Miller adds.

McAfee agrees that hijacking of cell phones -- whether feature-added voice phones with cameras or the newer breed of computer-based smart phones -- can happen, but appears to be a rare occurrence.

[Lowsix Profile]

Yes and unfortunately at the moment for particular phone systems, such as microsoft, the original user never even has to pick up the phone. The way they are doing it is by sending SMS (txt) messgaes to the phne using the code the carrier uses, and the phone thinks is an update or something that it should respond to...so it answers int he background.

The hackers then place software on it, or draw the phone to a website, where the contents can either be read, malicious software downloaded to it, or even used as a zombie from which to place free calls on YOUR phone from someone elses phone acct..meaning you get the bill.

Best thing to do is alert your carrier it is happening, and to examine your call logs to see if there are any physical alerts. Mine has them (sprint) so anything coming in registers, even if i dont answer.

here is a basic writeup of what im talking about..
but its nowhere near comprehensive:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32226815/ns ... -security/

Simply when googling for a story that could somewhat verify what i had heard, i found HUNDREDS of pages on how its done, and whatnot..some scary shit out there..i was blown away at the sheer number of hacks available..

So i dont think McAfee has it right, because a lot of this was script kiddie shit..

"type this sms and send to phone #"
Boom..free calls...that kinda shit..

[Shatnerswig Profile]

I thank you all for your input! low ,I did recieve a strange text a while back.... that might have done it. thanks again for all of your help.

[Immortalgropher Profile YIM]

Phones are always sending and receiving data. Doesn't mean your phone is hacked.

[Daemonfoe Profile Website]

I have my phone's internet completely disabled, all the service info is totally blank. How much does that protect me?