Shantanu Gawde will present his findings at the upcoming Ground Zero Summit

Oct 18, 2013 14:59 GMT  ·  By

At the upcoming Ground Zero Summit, one of Asia’s largest information security conferences, independent security researcher Shantanu Gawde will hold a presentation about a malware for Firefox OS.

The 17-year-old has developed a malicious program that’s capable of infecting Mozilla’s Linux-based, open source operating system.

The malware developed by the expert is capable of performing various tasks, including accessing the SD card, remotely transferring contacts, tracking the user’s location, remotely controlling the FM radio, uploading and downloading content, and uploading data to a server.

Until the conference starts, on November 7, Shantanu Gawde says he will try to explore even more “hacking possibilities.” He warns that, currently, there’s no way of detecting or mitigating such attacks.

The researcher has told The Hacker News that his work is meant to “motivate developers to ensure better security on their platforms.”