Why are Android anti-virus firms so slow to react on Carrier IQ?
Some Android anti-virus firms have begun releasing Carrier IQ detection apps, but only after the controversial software became a talking point on Capitol Hill ... and a month after a security researcher first discovered it.
BitDefender released Carrier IQ Finder, an app that identifies the presence of the controversial mobile diagnostic tool, following Lookout's earlier release of a similar tool called Carrier IQ Detector. Both applications let mobile phone users know if they have Carrier IQ running on their Android phone without actually removing it. Each has been available at no charge via the official Android Market since last Thursday (3 December).
In a statement, BitDefender said that Carrier IQ's mobile network diagnostic tool is "so deeply integrated with the device’s firmware [that] Carrier IQ Finder cannot remove it". Catalin Cosoi, global research director at Bitdefender, explained: "The Carrier IQ package can't be removed by the users themselves if they don't have root access on the device. They can, however, take the issue with the carrier and ask that the package be removed from the system."
