In In a matter of few days an app called Anti, which is short for Android Network Toolkit, will hit the market. Designed by an Israeli security firm called, Zimperium, the app was first displayed at the Defcon hacker conference in Las Vegas. The company plans to make the app available in the Android marketplace in the coming days. In theory, the app is designed for penetration testing, which means searching out and demonstrating vulnerabilities in computer systems so that they can be patched.
The makers of Anti claim that their aim is to bring all the hacking tools available to penetration testers on PCs to those with smartphones. There will be an innovative automated interface, with which users can sniff local networks. Owning of remote servers will become simple as pushing a few buttons. Itzhak Zuk Avraham, founder of Tel-Aviv-based Zimperium, says, We wanted to create a penetration testing tool for the masses. Its about being able to do what advanced hackers do with a really good implementation. In your pocket.
The most surprising thing is that Anti is being offered for free. However, if you decide to go in for the corporate version, you got to fork out $10. There are considerable advantages with the corporate version, as it is incorporated with a WiFi scanning tool for finding open networks and showing all potential target devices on those networks. It also has traceroute software that can reveal the IP addresses of faraway servers.
As soon as a potential target is identified, the app offers a simple menu with commands like Man-In-The-Middle to eavesdrop on local devices, or even Attack. The app will be able to run exploits collected in platforms like Metasploit or ExploitDB, using vulnerabilities in out-of-date software to compromise targets. According to sources, Zimperium has also developed a Windows Trojan that allows Anti to perform automated commands on hijacked machines like taking a screenshot, ejecting a CD, or opening the calculator.
Lot more improvements are going to be made in the app called Anti in times to come, but even in its present avatar, the app seems capable of some really dangerous attacks. For instance, a hacker might walk into an office on whatever pretext and start using his innocuous looking smartphone to sniff around for vulnerable machines, which he could use to steal data or insert malaware. Zimperium claims that it expects the users of its app to do White Hat penetration testing only; however, we cant ignore the likelihood of at least some of the users being tempted to get dangerously anti-social with the Anti on their Android smartphone.
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