Items tagged with Flashback
For years, Apple has propogated the myth that its computers were inherently secure thanks to its BSD roots, inherently better security management, or because Steve Jobs sacrificed puppies under the new moon to keep your platform safe. This created a dangerous perception that Macs were immune to viruses, trojans, or man-in-the-middle attacks. In reality, Apple has always benefited from security through obscurity -- when 90% or more of the world runs on PCs, PCs are the platforms hackers target. Apple has now quietly acknowledged this fact with a few judicious updates to its Max OS X page. The first change is to the side bar, where Apple's TL,DR benefit explanation is posted. We've gone from flat...
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Apple can't be too happy about having that Flashback malware news hit over half a million Mac users, and on a percentage basis, that's pretty extreme. But now, hopefully, the past can be the past. A new update in OS X Software Update patches Java, enabling the program (on Lion machines) to stop automatically executing Java applets. Users can still override the new default, and of course, this security patch "removes the most common variants of the Flashback malware." If you've been dealing with the issue, or just cautious not to get it, this update looks like one you shouldn't avoid....
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The Mac Security Blog from Intego, a Mac security software developer, has posted a security memo warning users of a new Trojan, dubbed Flashback, that is infecting OSX based systems. The Flashback Trojan masquerades as an Adobe Flash Player installer, and if an unsuspecting user downloads the file package and ultimately installs the Trojan, it will deactivate some security software, delete the installation package itself, install auto-launch code, and place a library in the /Library/Preferences/ folder that’s used to inject code into applications launched by the user. The Trojan then connects to a remote server and sends information about the infected Mac, including the machine’s...
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