Fears of the first malicious mobile Trojan on the loose have been allayed by the news that the virus only targets game pirates.
Warnings were issued this week that the new Trojan affects Symbian OS Series 60. The Trojan is inside a pirated copy of a game called Mosquitos, which is roaming file-sharing and software download sites. Once the pirated game is installed on a mobile device, the Trojan sends unauthorised SMS messages while the game is being played.
IT news service The Register reports that the company that made the original legitimate Mosquito game, Ojom, installed the program in earlier versions of the title to combat piracy. It was intended that the program secretly send an SMS message to alert the company if an unlicensed copy was being used.
Anti-virus firm F-Secure says the functionality backfired and Ojom removed it from later versions of the game. However, pirated versions of the game are still circulating on the Internet.
Users of mobile devices have been concerned they may soon face virus risks, following the June launch of the first proof-of-concept virus affecting cellphones.
The virus, Cabir, was not malicious and ran on the Symbian operating system, which is used in certain Nokia, Siemens, Motorola and Sony Ericsson phones.
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