Technology

User Alert: Supposedly ‘Virus Immune’ Macs Show Cyber Infections in U.K. and U.S.

One of the selling points for getting a Mac if you’re not a graphic designer is that they are generally virus-free, since he system is often touted to be immune to virus infections. But a new report from a Russian anti-virus vendor is saying a botnet has found and is exploiting a vulnerability in the Mac OS X system.

Reports range from the attack affecting between 550,000 and 600,000 computers with the majority being in the United Kingdom and the United States. Dr. Web has more on the virus:

Systems get infected with BackDoor.Flashback.39 after a user is redirected to a bogus site from a compromised resource or via a traffic distribution system. JavaScript code is used to load a Java-applet containing an exploit. Doctor Web’s virus analysts discovered a large number of web-sites containing the code.

[...]

According to some sources, links to more than four million compromised web-pages could be found on a Google SERP at the end of March. In addition, some posts on Apple user forums described cases of infection by BackDoor.Flashback.39 when visiting dlink.com.

Apple Releases Update for Java After It Was Exploited by Virus

Areas affected by the virus. (Image: Dr. Web)

Dr. Web reports that the attacks began in February and that Apple had closed the system’s vulnerability on April 3. On Wednesday, the blog Naked Security reported Apple had released an updated version of Java for OS X 10.6 and 10.7.

The Daily Mail describes the misconception by Mac users that their computer is immune to infections could be because the incomparably high number reported on Windows. Chester Wisiniewski for Naked Security wrote that since the attack took six weeks for Apple to address, he wonders if the company takes security for granted as much as many of its users as well:

This does make you wonder whether Apple takes security as seriously as it should. Perhaps its public facing image of being invulnerable is the prevailing attitude within the company.

Why Apple did not deploy these fixes before Mac users were victimized by criminals is unclear. Fortunately, once it became a problem the company responded quickly.

Naked Security reports that to see if you have the most updated version of Java on your Mac “open Terminal and type ‘java -version’.” If you see ”java version 1.6.0_31″, you’re all set. Naked Security also notes you could just remove Java all together. Wisniewski writes you can find how-to instructions to do this here.

Comments (27)

  • mathewsaddict
    Posted on April 6, 2012 at 11:09am

    For the record there is a difference between viruses and malware. The recent infections are malware which is installed by the user! There is nothing a computer can do when the user inadvertently tells it to install malware. Just sayin

    Report Post »  
    • mekusmilkdud
      Posted on April 6, 2012 at 7:40pm

      u could run live malware blockers some work ok malewarebytes catches a lot

      Report Post »  
  • T_Motes
    Posted on April 6, 2012 at 10:47am

    Whoever said that Macs couldn’t get a virus is an idiot, a liar, or both. Any electronic device can get a virus, even your phone, ipod, or tablet. You know the reason that there are fewer Mac viruses? It’s because there are far fewer Macs in use, so the people who create viruses normally only make them for Windows based computers as they are by for the most widely used operating systems.

    Report Post »  
  • bluesdog
    Posted on April 6, 2012 at 9:45am

    Mac folk-
    • Only download this kind of stuff directly from Adobe or other vendor. Don’t let a pop-up take you there.
    • Big point here- Turn off Java on your mac (not Javascript) as Java is rarely used when you are online.
    • Do not use macck**per as it will wreck your setup.

    Caveat Emptor

    Report Post »  
  • toomuchgovt
    Posted on April 6, 2012 at 6:46am

    This really makes me mad. I’ve been back and forth with apple about Java and other issues with our computers. Every single one of those “I think I know best employees” looked at me and said I was wrong. Really – now who is wrong. They always say with the utmost pomp “A apple can’t or rarely gets a virus or worm”. I’ve driven hours to reach a “tech store” – only to be told nothing is wrong. Well I took matters into my own hands and fixed it.

    These idiots should reimburse every apple user that complained about this problem months ago….They all said “no problem”, a user knows when there is a problem. Maybe this will be a lesson to APPLE – listen to your users and don‘t treat them like they don’t know. All Apple users go to disk utilities and run a check.

    Report Post » toomuchgovt  
  • suz
    Posted on April 6, 2012 at 3:38am

    yup. lately, i’ve noticed some odd things on my macbook.

    Report Post » suz  
  • duhwut
    Posted on April 6, 2012 at 1:30am

    Macs aren’t immune to viruses. One just has to right a different type of code to put a virus in a Mac.
    Why hasn’t there been any viruses attacking Macs yet so many with a PC?
    Well, Mac sucks liberal ballsack, and because +90% of people/businesses around the WORLD use PC since its better, and not an overpriced, glorified shiny metal plate of crap.

    Report Post » duhwut  
    • Macman1138
      Posted on April 6, 2012 at 6:25am

      Never seen one in all my years as a Mac Tech.
      You not what of you speak, my friend.

      Report Post » Macman1138  
  • mekusmilkdud
    Posted on April 5, 2012 at 11:05pm

    macman you have to be smart enough or run protection that is smart enough to locate malware, viruses rootkits etc I run several platforms, not on a mac though. I run some of them in vms , I like to play around with mint and ubuntu in gnome kde and unity I have not had problems with windows 7 because avg , comodo or other programs take care of the issues they locate. there will never be an immune os, HELLO , LOL unless u unplug the net and do not download anything LOL

    Report Post »  
  • Qoheleth
    Posted on April 5, 2012 at 7:15pm

    As my daughter would say “Well, Duh!“ The Mac has never been ”virus immune.“ The thing that ”protected” the Mac was essentially market share and hardware. Macs used to run proprietary CPUs, with a proprietary OS, but changed over to Intel and changed to a UNIX based OS some years ago. They’ve also more recently become a bit more popular, eating into the former 90% Windows saturation. (If you were a virus writer, would you write for an OS that had a 10% market share or a 90% market share?) I’m not sure what script-kiddies run, but most of the hackers I know use Linix or Unix of some sort, so it’s a lot easier for them to target Macs these days.

    Report Post » Qoheleth  
    • MAMMY_NUNN
      Posted on April 5, 2012 at 8:11pm

      Microsoft hates Linux because the rest of the world uses Linux I ended all the problems with windows when I switched to a fully encrypted Linux Distro.

      Report Post »  
  • LambdaCore
    Posted on April 5, 2012 at 6:09pm

    Apple products are NOT immune to viruses and other forms of mal-ware, and they NEVER HAVE BEEN! This isn’t rocket science! Apple products make up such a relatively small section of the PC market that it simply hasn’t been worth the time and trouble of mal-ware developers, who instead went after the much larger (and thus more profitable) Wintel PC market. As Apple’s share of the market increases, they will be subject to more and more exploits. That’s reason #1 why I don’t use Apple products: their inherent dishonesty in promoting (or failing to dispel) such an obvious lie.

    Report Post » LambdaCore  
  • thekuligs
    Posted on April 5, 2012 at 4:16pm

    Only very ignorant or mislead people thought Macs were IMMUNE to viruses. The larger chunk of the market they make up the more viruses that will pop up as they will look more desireable to computer hackers.

    Report Post » thekuligs  
    • Ed_Kel
      Posted on April 5, 2012 at 4:49pm

      How many THOUSANDS of virus’ are out there waiting to attack a PC everyday? And you try to make the case of ignorance on immunity because of this? … The second widespread virus in the past decade?!

      What an idiot ^

      Report Post »  
    • Doctor Nordo
      Posted on April 5, 2012 at 5:11pm

      But she’s right. Many morons out there do believe that macs are immune to viruses.

      Report Post » Doctor Nordo  
    • Esq.
      Posted on April 5, 2012 at 5:53pm

      I’ve been telling Mactards for years their overpriced computers were not immune to hackers/viruses, that the hackers just didn’t see the point in making viruses that only affected a tiny fraction of the market. Several of these conversations turned quite heated. Macs are “user friendly” which is a nice way of saying made for idiots who only want a computer for limited functions. As long as you are willing to accept the limitations (of which there are MANY) then apple products are great, but I would never trade my PC for a Mac.

      Report Post »  
    • Macman1138
      Posted on April 5, 2012 at 10:31pm

      No problems on my Macs or any of the customers I support.
      More hype than anything else.
      I’ve never had any of these problems since using Macs since 1984.
      Can any PC users say the same?
      No.

      Report Post » Macman1138  
  • MrMark
    Posted on April 5, 2012 at 4:09pm

    If you haven’t already done so, run Software Update under System Preferences and see if a new version of Java is available. If so, download and install it.

    Also, to see if you’re already infected, The following procedure (from Gizmodo.com) will tell you:

    1. Run the following command in Terminal:

    defaults read /Applications/Safari.app/Contents/Info LSEnvironment

    2. Take note of the value, DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES
    3. Proceed to step 8 if you got the following error message:

    “The domain/default pair of (/Applications/Safari.app/Contents/Info, LSEnvironment) does not exist”

    If you don’t get that error message, well, time to head to F-Secure for your fix. If you’re clean so far, you can move on to step eight:

    8. Run the following command in Terminal:

    defaults read ~/.MacOSX/environment DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES

    9. Take note of the result. Your system is already clean of this variant if you got an error message similar to the following:

    “The domain/default pair of (/Users/joe/.MacOSX/environment, DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES) does not exist”

    Report Post »  
  • applehill
    Posted on April 5, 2012 at 3:57pm

    Every computer and computer system is vulnerable to some kind of attack. Unix (Which is what OS X is built on) Linux, Windows, Android and any other operating system out there can get a virus. Apple does have fewer holes then Windows and added a integrated OS firewall before Windows. This is not the first time Apple has dealt with a virus. People say all the time that Mac‘s don’t get viruses because they’re so small. Well they’re not so small anymore. Someone like Apple bragging about no viruses, would surely be attacked daily from the ego manics that make viruses. So it would seem Apple does a almost in penetrable OS system as a Hacker would love those bragging rights.

    Report Post » applehill  
  • Freedomrules
    Posted on April 5, 2012 at 3:53pm

    Macs were never thought to be immuned to viruses. There just were never enough of them in the market for virus authors to waste their time writing Mac viruses. Now that Mac is increasing in popularity, more hackers will feel they are worth their time to exploit.

    Report Post »  
    • Macman1138
      Posted on April 6, 2012 at 6:30am

      The hole in Macintosh security is the users.
      Great hardware and software, nothing better since 1984.
      Bottom line.

      Report Post » Macman1138  
  • SerikFox
    Posted on April 5, 2012 at 3:38pm

    There are a ton more viruses for Windows then there are for macs. Means nothing about the quality of macs though – windows dominates so much of the market that it’s more valuable to hack than macs are. That’s why hacking macs is rare – not because they’re good (I hate the things honestly).

    Report Post »  
    • Macman1138
      Posted on April 6, 2012 at 6:51am

      You really need therapy.
      Go to the Apple Store and get some.

      Report Post » Macman1138  
  • CMart
    Posted on April 5, 2012 at 3:21pm

    Just a clarification: Macs have never been touted as being “virus-immune”. No computer is, and to ever suggest so is laughable.

    Rather, they have been touted as not getting the same viruses that Windows computers get. And that is because a) they are different operating systems, and b) since Windows has, historically, comprised more of a global market share of home computers compared to Macs, virus creators focused more of their attention to making viruses for Windows than Macs.

    With the rise of Apple, viruses affecting Macs/iOS will rise proportionally.

    Report Post »  
    • Macman1138
      Posted on April 6, 2012 at 6:32am

      Perhaps with your powers of prediction, you should purchase some lottery tickets.

      Report Post » Macman1138  

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