Government, you may have noticed, has been slowly getting its head around wireless (CIO Government Review, passim). It offers so much in the way of time-saving, money-saving, people-helping and maybe even people-saving efficiency that a lot of the early misgivings about, say, security have increasingly been set aside. Not that you could necessarily look to your neighborhood Tims for a serving of government-sanctioned Wi-Fi, but there's been a discernible easing of the guard. Why not, you could hear just about anywhere; if social workers, to cite just one obvious example, could carry their files around in their laptops b meaning they wouldn't have to hustle back to the office between cases just to get the latest data b well, that was all to the good. And on and on, through PDAs and gizmo-rich cell phones and the rest. Virus? Fuggeddaboutit, Tony.

Well, much of that may have been just a shade too prescient.

Tech security types are apparently worried about a new virus capable of walking the walk from a PC to all manner of mobile devices. They're working up a response, but it has yet to be deployed. And given the reach of this lovely little bug b it erases files on selected mobiles b that response will be needed sooner rather than later. There's more; check it out at http://www.itworldcanada.com/Pages/Docbase/ViewArticle.aspx?id=idgml-6b5e3b8b-76cd-40d7&s=7006978.

Efficient? It is to weep. And be scared. Very very scared.