Sprint customers with Total Equipment Protection will be able to access the new application, beginning today, at www.sprint.com/protection, where they will benefit from the following features:

• Locate lost device by sounding an alarm on the smartphone even if in silent mode, doing a real time locate via GPS technology, or viewing the smartphone’s location history on a map via a Web Interface
• Remotely lock their smartphone
• Erase contacts in the address book on a lost smartphone
• Backup, manage and restore contacts

With privacy protection technologies, you just need to push one button to hide selected contacts and their contact data, including call histories, contact list entries and SMSs, and mute their calls. Contacts can also be hidden automatically after a preset idle period or remotely by sending a predefined SMS. You can also filter out unwanted calls and SMSs by creating a white list and a black list of contacts.

Kaspersky Mobile Security 9 will help you keep your data confidential should your smartphone be lost or stolen, and can help locate a missing device too. The solution allows you to wipe confidential files or block them remotely by sending a special SMS; locate your lost device with the help of the GPS Find tool; or block your phone and be notified of its new number if the SIM card is replaced.

The software is currently available for purchase at the company website.

Kaspersky Lab, a leading developer of secure content management solutions, announces that the first malicious program classified as a Trojan-SMS has been detected for smartphones running on Google’s Android operating system. Named Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer.a, it has already infected a number of mobile devices.

The new malicious program penetrates smartphones running Android in the guise of a harmless media player application. Users are prompted to install a file of just over 13 KB with the standard Android extension .APK. Once installed on the phone, the Trojan uses the system to begin sending SMSs to premium rate numbers without the owner’s knowledge or consent, resulting in money passing from a user’s account to that of the cybercriminals.

The Trojan-SMS category is currently the most widespread class of malware for mobile phones, but Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer.a is the first to specifically target the Android platform. It should be noted that there have already been isolated cases of devices running Android being infected with spyware. The first such program appeared in 2009.

“The IT market research and analysis organization IDC has noted that those selling devices running Android are experiencing the highest growth in sales among smartphone manufacturers. As a result, we can expect to see a corresponding rise in the amount of malware targeting that platform,” says Denis Maslennikov, Mobile Research Group Manager at Kaspersky Lab. “Kaspersky Lab is actively developing technologies and solutions to protect this operating system and plans to release Kaspersky Mobile Security for Android in early 2011.”

Kaspersky Lab recommends that users pay close attention to the services that an application requests access to when it is being installed. That includes access to premium rate services that charge to send SMSs and make calls. When a user agrees to these functions during the installation of an application, the smartphone may then be able to make calls and send SMSs without further authorization.

The signature for Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer.a has already been added to Kaspersky Lab’s antivirus databases.

Click here to read the full press release

“We will be working with ARM to develop the security architecture for the next generation of mobile phones. This will enable people to access highly valuable services with convenience and security,” explains Dr. Kai Grassie, head of the New Business division at G&D.

Acceptance of mobile applications such as banking, ticketing and payment solutions rests on the security of device and background systems involved. For this reason, both companies have been working on innovative security concepts.

The interplay of TrustZone and Mobicore ensures that if online services require security-sensitive functions such as entry of user name and password or data output on a display, these functions are transferred to the Mobicore high-security operating system running in the TrustZone protected area of an ARM application processor. As the security-sensitive functions are executed, Mobicore maintains control of the secure area of a system-on-chip. Users can therefore be certain that the data they have entered, such as their username and password, cannot be manipulated by malware on the phone during a payment transaction.

ARM and G&D will present their joint concepts at the Mobile World Congress from February 15 to 18, 2010, in Barcelona.

Digipass for BlackBerry

For service providers and mobile application developers wanting to integrate authentication functionality directly into their application, VASCO also has a software development kit (DIGIPASS API). With DIGIPASS API, One-Time Password (OTP) and digital signature functionality is integrated into the application without having to change the existing user experience or the back-end infrastructure.

DIGIPASS for Mobile uses 3DES and AES and respects ANSI X4.13 specifications, widely used in the banking community. DIGIPASS for Mobile uses proven VASCO VACMAN® authentication technology and supports more than 400 types of mobile phones.

“Mobile phone users are increasingly embracing mobile services. As a result the mobile platform is becoming more and more attractive to hackers. Traditional Internet fraud schemes are moving towards the mobile environment. With DIGIPASS for Mobile companies offering their services online or mobile site service providers can enhance security of their online service channels through the authentication of their users and by digitally signing transactions. With DIGIPASS for Mobile becoming available to Windows Mobile users, we are convinced that the corporation will increasingly embrace the use of authentication,” says Jan Valcke, President and COO at VASCO Data Security.

F-Secure Mobile Security and its new anti-theft feature is available on June 24 for Windows Mobile phone users. The anti-theft feature includes remote lock, remote wipe and theft control functionalities. The remote lock can be used to lock the device to protect confidential information quickly and easily with a single SMS message. The theft control feature activates when the SIM card is changed by locking the device. As an ultimate safety measure to prevent misuse, it is possible to erase all the data on the phone with the remote wipe by sending an SMS message.

F-Secure Mobile Security 5 with Antitheft is available for Windows Mobile from June 24 and is already available for S60 3rd and 5th edition smartphones through the F-Secure eStore ( www.f-secure.com/estore), as well as F-Secure partners.

The Trend Micro Smart Protection Network is a cloud-client infrastructure that checks the security of more than five billion URL, email, and file queries daily, providing customers with real-time protection against web threats.

Key Features of Smart Surfing include:

• In-depth browser security powered by the Trend Micro Smart Protection Network that blocks access to malicious web pages.
• Color-coded search results that make it easy to identify harmful web pages.
• Three protection strength levels that users can modify according to their needs.
• Able to support browsing of multiple web pages at the same time.

Trend Smart Surfing is available for free from Apple’s App Store on iPhone and iPod touch

[via intomobile]

F-Secure Mobile for S60 3rd edition

Arnoud de Vaal, Solution Management Director, F-Secure Mobile Solutions Business Unit, says: “People store their personal information such as pictures, banking details, e-mails, business projects and other valuable and confidential data on their smartphones so it is important to protect your most personal computer. We are proud to be among the first service providers to offer a touch-based solution for S60 smartphone users through mobile operator partners and F-Secure eStore.”

F-Secure Mobile Security introduces combined real-time antivirus functionality with a firewall, antitheft and antispyware for S60 5th and 3rd Edition smartphones. F-Secure Mobile Security 5 introduces new features, including a totally redesigned user interface and advanced anti-theft features with remote lock, remote wipe and theft control functionalities.

F-Secure Mobile Security 5 will be available for S60 5th edition smartphones later this month. The software will also be available for the Windows Mobile platform later this spring.

Compared to the other biometric authentication techniques, vein authentication technology achieves uses the veins inside the human body. Finger vein patterns differ from person to person, each finger to finger, and it is said that they do not change over the years.

“mofiria” uses a unique method where a CMOS sensor diagonally captures scattered light inside the finger veins, making a plane layout possible. As a result, a small and more flexible design can be realized in building this technology into mobile devices. The vein pattern is extracted from the captured finger vein image, and data from the pattern is compressed into the size of one-tenth to store in memory, which makes it possible for the data to be stored on a mobile device.

The vein pattern can be captured without a fixed finger position, as the position of a placed finger is automatically and simultaneously corrected. The processing time for identification said to be as fast as 0.015 sec using a personal computer CPU and about 0.25 sec when using a mobile phone CPU.

Sony plans to promote the “mofiria” technology for use in mobile devices, gateway security systems and solution services. Sony will aim for commercializing this technology within the 2009 fiscal year.