back to article Trojan targets Mac's built-in security defences

Malware coders have created a Mac-specific Trojan that is designed to attack anti-malware defences built into Apple's Mac OS X operating system. The Flashback.C trojan disables the automatic update component of XProtect, OS X's anti-malware application, net security firm F-Secure reports. By wiping out files, the malware …

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  1. ElReg!comments!Pierre

    Must... resist

    The Shadenfreunde temptation, she is beink strong.

    1. sandman

      OMG

      Pitr has escaped from UserFriendly.org!

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Why?

      I laugh at Windows users - in their faces even - all the time there's a new bug... Fortunately that happens every day.

      Go ahead. You've waited long enough.

    3. Velv
      Joke

      Careful or you'll start to feel Glauckenstück

      (Rose, Two and a Half Men - "feeling deep remorse for having felt Schadenfreude.")

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        A joke in Two and a Half Men?

        Now I know you're full of shit

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    Not to worry...

    ...EVERYONE knows Apple products are IMMUNE from ALL attacks.

    Nothing to see here...please move along.

  3. jai

    so one more reason then...

    to avoid installing Flash player.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Masquerading as Flash?

    That's like a burglar masquerading as a squatter.

  5. Gareth Gouldstone
    Happy

    Original Source

    Just make sure you install flash from Adobe, not some dodgy site, Simples!

    Oh, and install a virus checker for the other 3 possible threats.

  6. Zippy the Pinhead
    Joke

    "Malware coders have created a Mac-specific Trojan that is designed to attack anti-malware defences built into Apple's Mac OS X operating system."

    Its actually targeting obscurity? Cool!!!

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Yay

    If it carries on like this pretty soon all those fanbois will be able to play with the popular kids

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Yes,

      In 20 years or so. Probably past caring by then, leave that for the new generation.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        past caring already, not even sure I ever did care I just enjoy winding up fanbois

  8. Rolf Howarth

    Trojan

    It's a trojan, not a virus or a worm. In other words, you have to download an app from an dodgy web site and enter your admin password to authenticate when it tries to install itself... and then bad things might happen? I'm shaking in my boots with fear at the mere thought of how dangerous my world has suddenly become.

  9. -tim
    FAIL

    White lists?

    How about just enabling white lists? Microware's OS-9 used it back in the 1980s.

  10. Ian Davies
    FAIL

    This is news, how?

    It's a trojan. It doesn't exploit any security hole. It uses social engineering to trick the user into giving it the access it wants. The only people who ever thought or claimed that the Mac was immune to stuff like this are the strawman-toting half-wits in the Windows world.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      WTF?

      Not hardly Sparky.

      " The only people who ever thought or claimed that the Mac was immune to stuff like this are the strawman-toting half-wits in the Windows world."

      No...it would be the Apple Lemmings who have espoused this line of fantasy...which apparently you are one...NOT Windows user.

  11. raving angry loony

    and...?

    Macs have always had trojans - which require convincing the user to install them. Hell, every operating system out there is vulnerable to convincing the users to install stuff. This is not news.

    The big news will be with the first MacOS virus - that propagate without user intervention. I note that the total count on those is still... zero. I have no doubt that some day some clever clogs will create one, but so far nobody has.

    1. eulampios

      not all

      Not really, *BSD and GNU/Linux distributives and apparently not. For these OS's 99.99 % of software installation and updates happen from central repositories/ports through package managers using checksums and PGP. Of course, repos/ports may as well be fooled/hacked to get end users install malware.. well that never happened.

      This free and open software has luxury, proprietary and non-free Mac OSX and Windows cannot afford

  12. largefile
    FAIL

    I find it interesting that the majority of the posts here are from what appear to be Mac defenders who are posting as though there were Windows people here attacking them. Nice pre-emptive move!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Not me

      I posted as a Flash attacker. Still waiting for the Flash fanbois (Flash-gits?) to get on the defense...

      1. Filippo Silver badge

        I don't think there are any Flash fanbois. It'd take a special kind of insanity to defend Flash's security.

    2. Ian Davies
      Mushroom

      Majority?

      You mean 3 out of the first 8 posts (not counting replies)? That kind of majority?

      Maths fail...

  13. pitagora

    Wouldn't have happened if they used......wait.....they did. Never mind.

  14. John I'm only dancing

    Not quite

    "The Flashback.C Trojan poses as a Flash Player installer."

    This should read: "The Flashback.C Trojan poses as a badly-written, bug-infested pile of excrement that should not be allowed anywhere near computer hardware."

    There, fixed it.

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