A vulnerability can be harnessed to root the Samsung Galaxy S3, the Note 2 and other devices powered by Exynos 4 chips. An XDA member with the handle "alephzain", who discovered the exploit, warns that this security hole can be used by malicious apps to read user data or brick its hardware.
What Else You Need To Know
- Samsung has not released a fix or issued a comment regarding the issue.
- To avoid malware, phone owners should exercise caution when downloading apps from Google Play and try to stick to software from trusted sources.
Other sources
This security hole is dangerous and expose phone to malicious apps.- Chris Smith, Android Authority
The good news is we can easily obtain root on these devices. The bad is [that] there is no control over it.- Alephzain, Hacker
- PhoneDog
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Exploit found to affect Samsung Galaxy S III and others, could allow malicious apps to grab user data
Samsung has yet to officially comment on this vulnerability, but XDA user Chainfire says that the forum thread concerning the exploit has been flagged for Samsung engineers to read, and user supercurio claims that some people at Samsung are now aware of the issue.
- Other
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Galaxy S3, Galaxy Note 2, other Android handsets featuring certain Samsung Exynos chips in danger, as new exploit is found
Ram dump, kernel code injection and others could be possible via app installation from Play Store. It certainly exists many ways to do that but Samsung give an easy way to exploit. This security hole is dangerous and expose phone to malicious apps. Exploitation with native C and JNI could be easily feasible.
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