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Rickroll virus attacks iPhones

The 'ikee' worm replaces the infected device's background picture with an image of Rick Astley.
Written by Liam Tung, Contributing Writer

An Australian has released a virus for the Apple iPhone, 'ikee', which replaces the infected device's background picture with an image of singer Rick Astley.

Security companies Sophos and F-Secure have issued warnings to owners of jailbroken iPhones to change root log-in passwords immediately. All iPhones are issued with the same root log-in password.

The worm, labelled "ikee", spreads using SSH (secure shell) protocol, which iPhones use to exchange data on a network.

iPhones are not shipped with SSH enabled. Users who do not have the messaging feature turned on should not be vulnerable; however, Sophos head of technology Paul Ducklin said if the feature has been enabled and the root password has not been changed, "you are woefully insecure".

According to fellow Sophos security consultant, Graham Cluley, the author of the virus is believed to be Ashley Towns, who operates on Twitter under the @ikee account.

Read more of "Rickroll virus attacks iPhones" at ZDNet Australia.

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