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- Thread starter EthelEli
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electricpete
Android Expert
Yeah, tricky to know with 100% certainty.
There is that stagefright vulnerability. Haven't heard that it's being exploited, but who knows.
More likely a wrong number as suggested above. You could call or text him back and ask who he was trying to reach (ideally he'd provide a name and number and you can check if it's close to yours). Of course returning the call could expose you to more unwanted communications if it's a prankster....not a problems if you have tools for blocking
If it was from California, I might be more concerned but Kentucky???... More likely a truck hacker than a phone hacker! ;-)
There is that stagefright vulnerability. Haven't heard that it's being exploited, but who knows.
More likely a wrong number as suggested above. You could call or text him back and ask who he was trying to reach (ideally he'd provide a name and number and you can check if it's close to yours). Of course returning the call could expose you to more unwanted communications if it's a prankster....not a problems if you have tools for blocking
If it was from California, I might be more concerned but Kentucky???... More likely a truck hacker than a phone hacker! ;-)
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electricpete
Android Expert
The bad news: It is a vulnerability in the Android system recently identified by researchers, where in theory someone can take over control your phone without your knowledge by sending you an MMS. Sounds scary, I know. But keep reading, it's probably not as bad as it sounds!
The good news: notice I said "vulnerability", not "exploit". In spite of large awareness and attention on this vulnerability, there are no confirmed reports of people actually being hacked by someone exploiting this vulnerability to my knowledge. There are some challenges and reason to be skeptical that the theory can be put into practice by hackers as Earlymon has mentioned. Like many things in security it's tough to separate the hype from the reality. Nevertheless there is an agressive industry response to this vulnerability in progress... lots of companies rolling out patches and announcing aggressive patch policies shortly after the vulnerability was identified.
More reading about Stagefright:
Androidforums thread
Phandroid articles
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electricpete
Android Expert
I don't know of specific means to check for this potential exploit.
In general look for phone to do odd and unexpected things.
Make sure there are no sms showing up that you didn't send and phone calls in your logs that you didn't make.
Perhaps consider Network Connections to monitor where your phone is communicating to (although I'd say it will require a little bit of time and study to use that app).
I'm at a loss to think what else to suggest, maybe others have ideas? @EarlyMon ?
Again, please keep in mind that there have been no confirmed cases reported publicly of folks being hacked by exploiting this particular vulnerability.
Come to think of it, I thought the scenario of concern for the stagefright vulnerability was a video sent over MMS not a picture sent over MMS like you had. Maybe someone can clarify.
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This or spam.
From the sms list of messages from people, long press the thread from this guy, and choose to block or blacklist.
Don't lose sleep over it.