Android and iOS mobile trojans likely used for surveillance through mobile devices of journalists and politicians, activists and human rights advocates have been discovered circulating in the wild...
The mobile trojans are designed to operate in a discreet manner, for instance monitoring a mobile device’s battery life so as not to ostensibly drain it, arousing suspicion. Then, when a victim is connected to a particular Wi-Fi network or while the device is plugged in to charge, it springs to life, unbeknownst to the user. Kaspersky said that the trojans are capable of performing a variety of surveillance functions, including intercepting phone calls and SMS messages, and chat messages sent from specific applications such as Viber, WhatsApp and Skype. It can also report the target’s location, take photos, copy events from the device’s calendar and more.
These mobile trojans are part of the allegedly ‘legal’ spyware tool, Remote Control System (RCS), aka Galileo. The mapping shows the presence of more than 320 RCS command & control servers in 40+ countries. The majority of the servers were found in the US, Kazakhstan, Ecuador, the UK and Canada. (more)
