iOS Malware Discovered Affecting Third-Party App Stores in China

[Maura]

Phone Arena reports that malware called WireLurker has been discovered infecting iOS devices via third-party app stores in China.

What makes this a particularly noteworthy discovery is the fact that it is able to infect unjailbroken iOS devices, making it the first ever malware to do so.

Experts speculate that hundreds of thousands of devices could be infected by the bug, which is transmitted via USB, and primarily via the Maiyadi App Store in China, which transfers apps from Mac OS to the user’s iOS device.

According to researchers, infected apps have been downloaded more than 350,000times from third-party app stores in China.

Scientists at Palo Alto Networks have devised software that can help detect if your device has been infected by WireLurker, but the best advice is to avoid third-party app stores in China.

As to the effects of WireLurker, Phone Arena says that it corrupts the apps on your device via binary file replacement, and can also turn other programs into malware.

Source:Phone Arena

 

[scifan57]

A very good reason to only use the official App Store.

 

[Pinkpoison]

A very good reason to only use the official App Store.

I'll second that.