Archive for July 23rd, 2008
Macs Gaining As Hacker Targets
Wednesday, July 23rd, 2008
The piece of Mac malware identified in June, named “OSX/Hovdy-A Trojan”, is the nastier of the two. It is capable of infiltrating a Mac, stealing passwords and opening the user’s firewall to enable future exploits. If the modus operandi sounds familiar, that ‘s because a lot of the same virus gangs who perfected their exploits on Windows machines are now tweaking them for Macs, Mr Cluley adds.
Scarier still, the same tech-novice PC owners who failed to fortify their computers properly, allowing them to become spam relays and zombie DDOS attackers, are now making the switch to Macs. “I think the Mac user base will end up becoming polluted by some of the same people who have been infected time and time again in the Windows environment,” Mr Cluley says. “It’s mainly the same people who buy a computer primarily to download porn and visit file-sharing sites.”
