Researchers at security company Lookout has uncovered a series of suspicious applications to Android.
It is about so-called wallpaper programs, simple apps that let the user change the wallpaper on your phone.
"Jackeey Wallpaper" and at least 80 similar programs sniff the user's cell phone number, your phone's unique IMSI code (International Mobile Subscriber Identity) and even the password to your voice mailbox, according to the Lookout.
The sensitive information should then have been uploaded to the server www.imnet.us, located in Shenzhen in southeastern China.
While this clearly is suspicious emphasizes the researchers that they have not found evidence that this is done with malicious intent.
- There have been cases with other mobile platforms, where developers simply have been over zealous with innsanking of data, without having intended anything wrong with that, write the chief technology officer Kevin Mahaffey in Lookout.
The findings were presented by the company during the Blackhat security conference in Las Vegas this week.
The above programs will all originate from two developers who call themselves "jackeey, wallpaper" and "IceskYsl @ 1sters!. The first of these will later be renamed to "callmejack.
Downloaded by millions
The programs were popular and is downloaded by many users. Google to later remove them from the Android Market.
Accurate figures on how many people have downloaded programs in the Android Market is not given, but according AndroLib we are talking about at least 4.1 million downloads.
