Spanish police arrest moby virus writer

Spanish police arrested a 28-year old man on Saturday they suspect of involvement with a mobile phone virus.

He is suspected of distributing malware which targetted Symbian phones. The arrest follows a seven month investigation.

AFP said it was the first time a mobile virus creator had been arrested in Spain.

Spanish police are claiming that the virus, which was propagated over Bluetooth connection, infected 115,000 Symbian handsets and cost users and their network operators millions of euros.

The only infection for which such claims aren't laughable is called Commwarrior, which did spread rapidly around Spain last year. In common with most Bluetooth infections users are required to accept the message, and agree to install the software, before any damage is done, and that damage is generally limited to propagation of the virus.

Quite why this cost millions of euros isn't clear; but claiming that a few people were inconvenienced would hardly justify the 7-month investigation.

More details here here, while F-Secure and O2 both detail the virus here and here.®