Samsung's flagship Galaxy S4 smartphone possibly has
vulnerabilities that allow hackers can send text messages without the
user's knowledge, according to new findings.
The Galaxy S4 has already registered 10 million owners worldwide.
Qihoo 360 Technology, a China-based antivirus company, which
discovered the vulnerability said it can potentially be used by SMS
Trojans to silently send texts and incur premium messaging charges.
Qihoo 360 Technology says that they have already reported the issue
to Samsung and the company is already in the process of developing an
official update to fix the vulnerability.
The antivirus firm says that the flaw is related to a cloud backup
feature in Galaxy S4. Qihoo explains that a rogue mobile application
could contain code exploiting the vulnerability to send fraudulent scam
text messages to premium-rate services.
Qihoo 360 Technology says, "By exploiting the vulnerable cloud backup
feature, malware could pretend to be the identity of any contact,
friend, relative, or company/organization (including your banks) when
faking phishing SMS messages. When these phishing SMS messages are
received, users may be tricked into clicking fraudulent links or
disclosing sensitive personal information."
The firm also recommends that Galaxy S4 users should temporarily
disable the cloud backup feature when not in use. It also took the
opportunity to advise Galaxy S4 users that its Android mobile security
app, 360 Mobile Security is protected by the issue.
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