From: InfoSec News (alertsinfosecnews.org)
Date: Wed Jul 15 2009 - 00:28:43 CDT

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http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/07/blackberry-spies/

By Kim Zetter
Threat Level
Wired.com
July 14, 2009

A Blackberry update that a United Arab Emirates service provider pushed
out to its customers contains U.S.-made spyware that would allow the
company or others to siphon and read their e-mail and text messages,
according to a researcher who examined it.

The update was billed as a “performance enhancement patch” by the
UAE-based phone and internet service provider Etisalat, which issued the
patch for its 100,000 subscribers.

The patch only drew attention after numerous users complained that it
drained their Blackberry battery and slowed performance, according to
local publication ITP.

Nigel Gourlay, a Qatar-based programmer who examined the patch, told ITP
that the patch contained “phone-home” code that instructed the
Blackberries to contact a server to register. But once the patch was
installed, thousands of devices tried to contact the server
simultaneously, crashing it and causing their batteries to drain.

[...]

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