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Posted on 12/06/2007 9:59:43 AM PST by driftdiver
After years of relative safety, the Apple Mac is becoming an increasingly tempting target for malicious computer hackers, according to a new report published this week.
Security researchers have been aware of the threat to Apple since last year, when they detected the first piece of malicious code – or “malware” – specifically designed to target Apple.
Over the past few months, however, the number of malicious programmes has increased, according to a report published this week by F-Secure, an internet security company.
“Over the past two years, we had found one or two pieces of malware targeting Macs,” said Patrik Runald, an F-Secure security researcher. “Since October, we’ve found 100-150 variants.”
(Excerpt) Read more at ft.com ...
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
We LOVE apple slices and popcorn on a cold winter evening!
And to all the Apple zealots... schadenfreude.
tech ping
Share mine.
It's fresh from my iPop...
We’ve been hearing about these hackers supposedly shifting their attention to Macs for several years now. They’ve had some success in targeting specific computers in a test environment, but they’ve failed to come up with a viable worm or virus that would be a widespread threat. A few trojan horses have been spotted, but they’ve failed to make any significant headway.
“The very architecture of UNIX makes it impossible for malware to run without user permission being granted.”
You mean there’s no such thing as a root exploit, or a buffer overrun that assumes priviledges? Unix is unhackable?
“The very architecture of UNIX makes it impossible for malware to run without user permission being granted.And there is no registry to write to, unlike in Windows.”
And people are usually the weakest part of any security program. This is gonna be fun to watch as long as you don’t own a mac.
Apple has been quietly issuing security fixes. Last one I saw included about 35 patches. Many are browser, video, or audio related.
“A few trojan horses have been spotted, but they’ve failed to make any significant headway.”
Thats what you said last time. I also said last time it was because very few hackers were focused on apple.
Vista was a boondoggle for Microsoft. Lets see how apple handles their success.
Unlike the Windows PC, no malware exists that can take over a Mac, without the owner authorizing it. Nor will it exist, due to the fundamental nature of the underlying UNIX architecture of the OSX operating system.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
“You mean there’s no such thing as a root exploit, or a buffer overrun that assumes priviledges? Unix is unhackable?”
Unix is harder to hack but is not unhackable. Toss in a unsophisticated user and its not all that difficult. MANY of the systems that have been hacked were a unix varient.
Who on earth would download software that they know nothing about? Not I---so my Mac is still safe.
You’ll have to excuse members of The Cult of Mac, they’re ignorant to anything outside of their pretty Apple products and don’t realize that OS X isn’t even based on Unix, but a BSD derivative.
So they don’t realize that there are plenty of ways to hack a Mac, and more to the point most of the users that are adopting Macs aren’t the most computer savvy lot and don’t think they’re vulnerable.
Should be interesting to see how this progresses.
None the less, Apple users, welcome to wild world of greater market share :)
Hyperlinks and attachments containing malicious code will not just "install" without further authorization from the computer user prompted by the operating system, unlike a Windows PC.
“Who on earth would download software that they know nothing about? Not I-—so my Mac is still safe.”
Many many many people. If they are so secure why use a firewall?
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