The iPhones are requesting a router address that's not valid on Duke's network . When there's no answer, the iPhones keep asking, a process that essentially amounts to a distributed denial-of-service attack, knocking out access points and keeping Duke's I.T. staff scrambling.

Miller said there are about 150 iPhones on campus causing the issue, but noted that "because of the time of year for us, it's not a severe problem." When school starts full sessions in late August, "this would be devastating," he said.

The Blame Game

While the Duke staff is pointing the finger at Apple, outside experts are saying there's really no way to tell if the problem is with the iPhone or Duke's Cisco network. "At this point, it's all hearsay and speculation," said nCircle director of security operations Andrew Storms, who noted that no technical expert with first-hand knowledge has analyzed the problem.

The jury is still out on whether this problem will crop up in enterprise settings when enough iPhones are present, or just in organizations running Cisco wireless networks. Storms said the problem might simply be the way Duke configured its network.

Still, the problem might turn out to be Apple's fault. "This appears to be the first widespread deployment of iPhones in a wireless network, so this may have exposed an issue with Apple's implementation," Storms said. "The big takeaway from this is, 'Stay tuned.' Enterprises don't have enough information."

Security Risks Exposed?

Even prior to this issue at Duke, both nCircle and Gartner have issued stern warnings about the security risks that iPhones might pose to the enterprise. "A lot of my concerns are about the lack of enterprise security tools," Storms said in a telephone interview, noting that, as of yet, centralized configuration tools "simply don't exist" for the iPhone.

"You want to be able to centrally configure security compliance, passwords, and encryption of data ," he said. By way of example, Storms cited one tool by Research In Motion that allows an administrator to "nuke" a BlackBerry remotely. If someone mistakenly leaves a BlackBerry in a cab, for instance, I.T. admins can send a self-destruct signal and the BlackBerry will wipe itself clean. (continued...)

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