Panic as Apple iPhone users are attacked by Windows penguins

By Davey Winder
Thursday, 18 September 2008 17:45

Mobility

What do you get if you mix Windows users with an Apple iPhone, stir well using some panicking penguins and decorate with a chunk of spam? The blindingly obvious answer is the latest Trojan attack, of course...

The iPhone itself is not totally immune from malware. Back in January reports circulated confirming the existence of 113 Prep.

This was not, it has to be said, the most cunningly clever bit of malware ever invented. Perhaps because the author, mucking around with some XML files when he built it, was only 11 years old.

Executing the 'malicious' app just reveals it to say 'shoes' and nothing else. Although deleting it does also deleted some files which in turn breaks some applications.

However, now we have the appearance of an iPhone Trojan that does not even run on the iPhone itself. Instead it is aimed squarely at iPhone using Windows users. Actually, let me rephrase that: it is aimed squarely at iPhone using Windows numpties.

After all, why would any intelligent person open an email claiming to be distributing a free iPhone game as an attachment? How stupid do you need to be to play the games a spammer sends you?

Anyway, Penguin Panic has been around in many guises and on many platforms for many, many months. Most recently it has arrived as an accelerometer driven game on the iPhone.

The trouble is that what is attached to the email promising "Apple: The most popular game" is actually just a Trojan.

Penguin.Panic.zip contains the computer compromising Troj/Agent-HNY according to Graham Cluley who tells me that it banks on people familiar with the iPhone game being tempted "to set a new high score at their desks this lunchtime."

Running unsolicited executables is a mugs game, even if it involves penguins.

Ironically, the executable will not run on Mac OS X, Linux, the Apple iPhone or other devices and no variations that will have been spotted by Sophos. Only Windows PCs.

The problem is that it is an attractive proposition for iPhone users who have become hooked on the multitude of games available through the App Store, and who happens to have a Windows PC on the desk at work.

The chance to waste some time with those pesky penguins in a different environment might be just tempting enough for them to leave their common sense at home...