SEOUL, KOREA – From July, smartphone makers like Samsung electronics, LG Electronics and Pantech will release smartphones with vaccine programs set in auto-run mode. In addition, the icon of a vaccine program will be displayed on the smartphone main screen to remind smartphone users of the existence of pre-installed smartphone vaccine programs.
On Tuesday, the Korea Communications Commission (KCC) and Korea Internet Security Agency (KISA) said they have reached agreement with smartphone makers to protect users from the onset of malware and transaction scams via smartphones.
Though the existing smartphones were also released with vaccine programs on board, users had to activate them personally. Besides, the rate of vaccine program usage was low. Against this backdrop, the KCC last December started consultations with smartphone manufacturers on the issue of setting vaccine programs on newly released smartphones in auto-run mode.
According to the 2012 privacy protection survey released by the KCC, a mere 31.1% of the surveyed smartphone users were using vaccine programs, down 23.3 %/p from 54.5% a year ago.
Sean Chung (hbpark@etnews.com)
**Article provided by etnews [Korea IT News]
[Reference] : http://english.etnews.com/electronics/2715655_1303.html
