Researchers at the UC San Diego division of the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology (Calit2) have deployed Bluetooth scanners around the UCSD campus to study a potential new threat to cyber security: mobile malware.

Mobile malware is the spread of malicious software between wireless devices, in this case among Bluetooth-enabled mobile devices.

The Proximity Driven Mobile Malware project, informally known as "Project BlueMap", is designed to track interactions among Bluetooth users at several heavily trafficked locations on the UCSD campus, including Geisel Library and the Price Center.

Each scanner can detect multiple Bluetooth devices at any given time, provided those devices are within 10 to 20 meters of the scanner and that they are in "discoverable" mode (to ensure the privacy of users who do not want to be tracked by the scanners).

So far, UCSD's BlueMap scanners have detected thousands of Bluetooth encounters. (An encounter is defined as two or more Bluetooth devices detected at the same time in the same location.)

Once the data are collected, researchers will run computer simulations to determine how a virus or other form of mobile malware might theoretically spread between the detected users, much as a biological scientist might determine how a pathogen might be spread between humans in close contact.

"By using these traces, we create models of generic contact patterns," said Per Johansson, principal development engineer for wireless networking in the UCSD division of Calit2.

"These sensors are passive windows into a particular location. The idea is that you could get a pretty good model of how people are moving, and how malware might be spread."