US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
blog.malwarebytes.com
US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
1–10 of 37 posts
Re: US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
#2One can take the sim and install it any phone you like though...
Re: US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
#3One can take the sim and install it any phone you like though...
Recommended imo
Re: US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
#4One can take the sim and install it any phone you like though...
If the government is giving you a free phone, I'd hope its because you couldn't otherwise afford one.
https://www.fcc.gov/general/lifeline-program-low-income-cons...
Re: US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
#5> The only difference between the two codes are their variable names. The more discernible variant of this malware uses Chinese characters for variable names. Therefore, we can assume the origin of this malware is China.
I mean... that’s possible and not an unlikely scenario - I guess. But it’s hardly anything but an anecdote. If I was a Russian or American hacker, I would have Chinese variable names swapped out with mine before I released the code.
Re: US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
#6The article shows how to uninstall it. How does that make it unremovable? The uninstall procedure is fully stock, just a slightly different path than most are used to. Most people hold the icon and drag it to the uninstall text. This goes into the app's info screen from where you can click uninstall.
Re: US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
#7Chinese malware on a Chinese phone given to US citizens at a massive discount..
Sounds like a brilliant cyber-espionage tactic.
Re: US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
#8One can take the sim and install it any phone you like though...
If the government is giving you a free phone, I'd hope its because you couldn't otherwise afford one. https://www.fcc.gov/general/lifeline-program-low-income-cons...
With a hand-me-down phone from a friend, the device is still free, and you're getting the subsidy on the monthly service charges.
Re: US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
#9Most corporate issued phones and computers come with lots of pre installed malware too. Apple bakes this into MacOS too (MDM).
Re: US government-funded phones come pre-installed with unremovable malware
#10> The only difference between the two codes are their variable names. The more discernible variant of this malware uses Chinese characters for variable names. Therefore, we can assume the origin of this malware is China. I mean... that’s possible and not an unlikely scenario - I guess. But it’s hardly anything but an anecdote. If I was a Russian or American hacker, I would have Chinese variable names swapped out with…
For what it's worth, if the image they used is representative of the other variable names they found, then that line of reasoning doesn't make sense - the names are just gibberish characters in Chinese, and some even have random radicals and other characters thrown in. This seems more like the type of strings you get when you take a bunch of random valid UCS-2 code points.