Phone viruses on the rise

They're not a big deal yet, but if a cell phone user at your house comes to you some day and says, "Mom, my phone's making calls without me!", it may be a virus. The "cabir" mobile-phone virus has been spotted "in the wild" in the US, ZDNET reports. It "turned up in two Nokia 6600s on display in a California mobile phone store, in what is believed to be the first 'on-the-ground' sighting of the virus in the United States." The phones could've been "infected" by someone walking by the store window who had a phone with Bluetooth on it (technology that connects PCs, phones, printers, etc. wirelessly). It's just a sign of things to come, although there are 30 known cell-phone viruses so far, compared to some 112,000 for PCs. "Experts confirm that there's no need to panic, but admit the threat is growing" as mobiles become the main way to access the Net, ZDNET reports in another article. The ZDNET articles explain which phones are more vulnerable and what past and present phone viruses do to phones (and potentially users' family budgets). Some examples: forcing phones to dial premium-rate numbers, emergency services, or users' entire address books.