Following the retirement of the American space shuttle in July, the Soyuz rocket is the only means of getting astronauts and cosmonauts to the ISS. August's failure saw manned flights stand down even longer than the six weeks for unmanned Soyuz rockets, and the hiatus put a severe strain on the operation of the space station.
The new project will send a strain of bacteria called Bacillus Subtilis into space to see if introducing different nutrients or compounds in the microgravity environment could block its growth.
Lookout said it recently found a text-generating strain of malware in a copied version of the "Angry Birds Space" app on Anzhi, an app store in China for Android devices.