“Security researchers say they’ve uncovered a flaw in several smartphone models produced by HTC that gives any application that has Internet access the keys to a trove of information on the phone, including e-mail addresses, GPS locations, phone numbers, and text message data.’ reports PCWorld
“Phone models claimed to be affected by the vulnerability are the EVO 3D, EVO 4G, Thunderbolt, and possibly HTC’s Sensation line.
The researchers, Trevor Eckhart, Artem Russakouskii, and Justin Case, say they informed HTC of the vulnerability on September 24, but after HTC failed to respond to their warning for five days, they went public with their knowledge on Friday.”
UPDATE:
HTC confirms security hole.
HTC Public Statement
HTC takes claims related to the security of our products very seriously. In our ongoing investigation into this recent claim, we have concluded that while this HTC software itself does no harm to customers’ data, there is a vulnerability that could potentially be exploited by a malicious third-party application. A third party malware app exploiting this or any other vulnerability would potentially be acting in violation of civil and criminal laws. So far, we have not learned of any customers being affected in this way and would like to prevent it by making sure all customers are aware of this potential vulnerability.
HTC is working very diligently to quickly release a security update that will resolve the issue on affected devices. Following a short testing period by our carrier partners, the patch will be sent over-the-air to customers, who will be notified to download and install it. We urge all users to install the update promptly. During this time, as always, we strongly urge customers to use caution when downloading, using, installing and updating applications from untrusted sources.
