Second iPhone virus found: doing bad things this time

The virus which hacks jailbroken iPhones, putting a picture of Rick Astley as a user's wallpaper instead, has been turned into something altogether more nasty.

Hacker Ikeeex was responsible for the virus, which is able to jump into jailbroken iPhones as most have the same default root password.

He said at the time that he wanted to raise awareness of the issue with the easy to break password, and using Rick Astley pictures was a fun way of doing it.

But now another hacker has taken the virus code and made it into something altogether more sinister.

We're not RickRolling any more

Called 'iPhone/Privacy.A' by online security firms, the new strain will be able to retrieve emails, SMS messages, calendars, photos and pretty much all other data you've captured with your little bundle of Apple joy.

It's currently unknown whether the hacker is actually doing anything with the data, but the fact is it's totally invisible, so you won't even know what's happening.

Security firm Intego has said that this virus could be spread simply by sitting in an internet cafe and scanning passing iPhones, releasing the virus into the wild.

So if you're one of the six to eight per cent who have a jailbroken iPhone, at least change your root password – it might only be a short term measure, but it makes sense.

Via BGR