Press Release

Fortinet Provides Protection Against "Curse of Silence/CurseSMS" Mobile Attack

Fortinet's FortiCleanUp Tool for Curse of Silence/CurseSMS Enables Recovery After SMS/MMS Denial of Service Attack
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Posted 05 January 2009 @ 05:00 pm ET

SUNNYVALE, CA -- (Marketwire) -- 01/05/09 -- Fortinet® -- the pioneer and leadingprovider of unified threat management (UTM) solutions -- today announcedthat its FortiGuard® Global Security Research Team has released a newversion of the FortiCleanUp tool to help users recover from the recentlydiscovered "Curse of Silence" mobile attack (also known as CurseSMS).Fortinet's FortiCleanUp is a range of free tools running on Symbian(TM)OSS60-powered phones and designed to remove and recover from specific mobilemalware and their related variants.

The "Curse of Silence/CurseSMS" attack is a remote SMS/MMS denial ofservice that was recently discovered by Tobias Engel and revealed at the25th Chaos Communication Congress. The attack involves sending amaliciously crafted SMS to potential targets. Upon receipt of that SMS, thetargeted device may no longer be able to receive SMS or MMS messages.Depending on the operating system version of the targeted mobile phone, thedevice may require a factory reset to properly function again.

Fortinet provides a free-of-charge license to its new FortiCleanUp tool,which helps users to recover once their mobile phone has been attacked by"Curse of Silence/CurseSMS." The FortiCleanUp tool for Curse ofSilence/CurseSMS automatically scans and removes malicious SMS/MMS messagesthat are preventing the proper functioning of the handset.

Potentially vulnerable devices include Nokia phones running SymbianOS S602nd Edition Feature Pack 2, 2nd Edition Feature Pack 3, 3rd Edition, and3rd Edition Feature Pack 1. This includes several phones of the "N" seriesup to the N95 and of the "E" series up to the E90, as well as older modelssuch as the 6680.

For complete real-time protection, the FortiGuard team recommends theinstallation of Fortinet's FortiClient Mobile on mobile devices. Thissecurity application provides unified security agent features includingpersonal firewall, IPSec VPN, antivirus, antispyware and SMS anti-spam.FortiClient's protection agent is powered by FortiGuard securitysubscription services to help protect devices against today's blendedthreats. FortiClient Mobile provides light-weight, unified security agentfeatures and is available for Microsoft® Windows Mobile(TM) and SymbianOSS60 operating systems.

For additional information on this advisory or to get the complete list ofNokia phones targeted by the "Curse of Silence/CurseSMS" attack, please goto: http://www.fortiguardcenter.com/advisory/FGA-2008-31.html.

For ongoing threat research, bookmark the FortiGuard Center(http://www.fortiguardcenter.com/) or add it to your RSS feed by going tohttp://www.fortinet.com/FortiGuardCenter/rss/index.html. To learn moreabout FortiGuard Subscription Services, visithttp://www.fortinet.com/products/fortiguard.html.

About Fortinet (www.fortinet.com)

Fortinet is the pioneer and leading provider of ASIC-accelerated unifiedthreat management, or UTM, security systems, which are used by enterprisesand service providers to increase their security while reducing totaloperating costs. Fortinet solutions were built from the ground up tointegrate multiple levels of security protection -- including firewall,antivirus, intrusion prevention, VPN, spyware prevention and antispam --designed to help customers protect against network and content levelthreats. Leveraging a custom ASIC and unified interface, Fortinet solutionsoffer advanced security functionality that scales from remote office tochassis-based solutions with integrated management and reporting. Fortinetsolutions have won multiple awards around the world and are the onlysecurity products that are certified in six programs by ICSA Labs:Firewall, Antivirus, IPSec VPN, SSL VPN, Network IPS, and Antispam.Fortinet is privately held and based in Sunnyvale, California.

Copyright © 2008 Fortinet, Inc. All rights reserved. The symbols ® and(TM) denote respectively federally registered trademarks and unregisteredtrademarks of Fortinet, Inc., its subsidiaries and affiliates. Fortinettrademarks include, but are not limited to, the following: Fortinet,FortiGate, FortiGuard, FortiManager, FortiMail, FortiClient, FortiCare,FortiAnalyzer, FortiReporter, FortiOS, FortiASIC, FortiWiFi, FortiSwitch,FortiVoIP, FortiBIOS, FortiLog, FortiResponse, and FortiDB. Othertrademarks belong to their respective owners. Fortinet has notindependently verified statements above attributed to other parties, andFortinet does not endorse any such statements.

Media ContactsJennifer LeggioFortinet, Inc.+1 408.486.7876jleggio@fortinet.com


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