Your iPhone almost certainly isn't infected with the AceDeceiver malware

Yesterday it emerged that iPhone and iPad users are under threat from newly-discovered malware called AceDeceiver that can infect non-jailbroken iOS devices by leveraging a flaw in Apple's FairPlay DRM mechanism.

But don't panic, the sky is not falling. Take a few breaths from a brown paper bag and understand that there's little chance that your devices have been taken over and transformed into a festering hellstew of malware.

According to award-winning computer security expert Graham Cluley, you're only in the firing line "if you connect your iPhone or iPad to your Windows PC and live in China."

"For the attack to succeed," writes Cluley on the Intego Mac Security blog "the Windows computer--which is to be connected to the iOS device--has to have already been compromised with malware."

This is an ironic twist, especially given the initial guffawing from the Windows crowd.

So if you only connect your iOS device to a Mac, or you don't connect your device to a computer at all, then you're perfectly safe. Additionally, if you live outside mainland China, this malware won't even activate itself (which seems to be how it avoided being discovered by Apple for so long).

The Windows malware comes in the form of a program called Aisi Helper, which claims to be a tool to help iPhone and iPad users backup and jailbreak their devices. If you've ever come across their piece of software then it's recommended that you uninstall it (maybe run a virus scan too, just in case), and then change your Apple ID passwords as soon as possible. It might also be a good idea to turn on two-factor authentication for your account.

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For enterprise, the advice is to check devices for any unknown or unusual enterprise provisioning profiles and to scan devices for the following bundle identifiers:

• aisi.aisiring
• aswallpaper.mito
• aswallpaper.mito
• i4.picture

The bottom line is that those who don't jailbreak their iPhones and iPads are still far safer than their jailbreaking counterparts, but, as Cluley says, "those of us who chose not to jailbreak our iPhones and iPads are a little less safe than we thought before."

See also:

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