McAfee will offer Cingular Wireless customers mobile security solutions for business-oriented devices. McAfee provides comprehensive mobile security solutions that are designed to protect against and prevent mobile threats and vulnerabilities. Its flagship product is McAfee VirusScan Mobile.

Under the terms of the agreement, McAfee VirusScan Mobile will be available to Cingular customers for download to their Symbian Series 60, Microsoft Windows Mobile Pocket PC or SmartPhone wireless devices. Individuals will be able to purchase a one-year subscription for $29.99 from McAfee through Cingular's MediaNet Web portal. The subscription includes automatic, over-the-air updates against any newly discovered mobile viruses and threats.

Mobile malware (viruses, Trojans, and other threats) has been tracked since 2004 by McAfee's AVERT (Anti-Virus Emergency Response Team) Labs. It has appeared on smartphones-mobile devices that can access the Internet-as well as feature phones, mobile devices that do not have Internet access and are used largely to make phone calls. In the case of feature phones, rather than being vulnerable to viruses or Trojans, hackers have exploited vulnerabilities resulting from poorly written software code. (In this instance, the most common damage has been denial of service attacks.)

McAfee VirusScan Mobile provides scanning, detection and cleaning of mobile data to prevent corruption due to viruses, worms, spyware, malware, and other technology abuses. It protects devices against the threats that originate from e-mail, instant messaging, and Internet downloads, and protects multiple entry points including SMS, MMS, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. Up-to-date protection is delivered as soon as threats are identified through McAfee's leading research organization, AVERT. Currently McAfee supports Microsoft Windows Mobile PocketPC and SmartPhone as well as Symbian Series 60 operating systems.

To further ensure mobile security, McAfee will introduce McAfee Firewall Mobile, which provides protection against hackers and data-stealing applications, monitoring both inbound and outbound communication for malicious behavior, in the second quarter of 2006.