What the hack, it’s mobile phones now

For computer-hackers and virus writers, the next frontier in mischief is the cellphone. And the possibilities include a cellphone virus or Trojan horse programme instructing handsets to forward the cellphone-user’s personal address book to others, eating into a cellphone’s operating software and erasing personal information.

Fiction? Well, such incidents are already dogging Japan and Europe.

“Mobilephone hacking is a reality. There is every chance of mobilephone hacking having entered India with cases going unreported,” says cyber-law expert Pavan Duggal, “Even as cellphone networks become increasingly sophisticated, there is a simultaneous increase in the number of points within wi-fi networks which can be broken into. India will definitely hear of cellphone-hacking cases by next year.” Buy a cellphone, get a hacker free. “If a malicious code gets control of your cellphone, it can toll numbers, receive your messages and send them elsewhere,” explains Dinesh Shandliya, software-security expert and “ethical hacker”. “Wireless architecture suffers from all the vulnerabilities of Internet architecture. As cellular phones morph into computer-like smartphones able to surf the web, send e-mail and download software, they are prone to the same tribulations which have waylaid computers.”

According to Section 66 of India’s IT Act, anybody found hacking
a mobile network is liable to face imprisonment of three years and pay a fine of Rs 2 lakh. “Still,” points out Duggal, “loopholes allow hackers to use just about anybody’s Internet protocol to break into a network. So, it is difficult to track down the guilty.” Warning bells toll for cells. No phoney talk this,

Tags: Mobile Phone hacking, Cell phone hacking, virus writer, cell phone network