Hacked iPhones hit by Astley worm

 

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Posted on 9 Nov 2009 at 10:33

The first worm targeting the iPhone has made an appearance in the wild, by exposing a vulnerability in hacked handsets.

The worm, dubbed Ikee, changes the victim’s wallpaper to a picture of Rick Astley sporting the message “ikee is never going to give you up”. Once done, it seeks out other vulnerable phones on the network to infect.

Ikee only works on jailbroken iPhones‚ where an SSH utility has been installed to enable the handset with unofficial mobile networks and software. Te worm preys on the fact that SSH’s default password is “alpine”, meaning that anybody who’s changed their password, or not jailbroken their iphone, will be safe.

It appears, however, that the worm is intended to serve as a wakeup call, with the underlying code containing a message barracking people for not changing their root password.

“People are stupid, and this is to prove it. It’s not that hard guys, but hey, who cares, it’s only your bank details at stake,” writes the hacker identified as ikex.

However, while the worm may not be malicious, experts have warned that it’s far from harmless.

“Other inquisitive hackers may be tempted to experiment once they read about the world’s first iPhone worm,” says Sophos’s senior technology consultant Graham Cluley.

“Furthermore, a more malicious hacker could take the code written by ikee and adapt it to have a more sinister payload.”

So far, the worm has only troubled Australian iPhones, though Cluley says he expects it to spread.

This is the second breach of jailbroken iPhones in the space of a fortnight, after a hacker in the Netherlands left messages demanding cash by logging into insecure handsets.

“Important Warning Your iPhone's been hacked because it's reallyInsecure! Please visit doiop.com/iHacked and secure your iPhone right now! Right now I can access all your files. This message won't disappear until your iPhone's secure.”

The web page has since been taken down by doiop.com’s administrators.

Author: Stuart Turton / Simon Aughton