More and more become Mac fans in the world, and more and more
peopel pay attention to mac news and information. If so, you can't
miss this wonderful and useful article. The fact that Mac users
have fallen victim to "scareware" scams -- the kind that have long
plagued Windows users -- shouldn't come as a surprise. After all,
fake antivirus software schemes like MacDefender don't have to rely
on exploitable vulnerabilities, but instead typically depend on
tricking users into visiting malicious sites and duping them into
installing the software.
And Mac users, for all their pretensions otherwise, are as
fallible as the next person. But from the news accounts this month
about MacDefender, and the posts not only on Mac-specific blogs but
also on ones usually devoted to Windows, you could be forgiven for
thinking that Macs are suddenly the victims of choice. They're not.
Windows machines remain the most common target because, well,
globally Windows PCs outnumber Mac OS by more than 16-to-1. What is
true is that Mac users now face the same scareware scams that
Windows owners have had to deal with for years. So what's the deal?
Macpocalypse or not? And what should you watch for, and what can
you do to keep safe? Those are the questions we try to answer.
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Is MacDefender a worm? Nope. Although MacDefender and its ilk
fall under the general term "malware" -- as in, it's malicious in
some way -- it's not a virus, not a worm, not a true Trojan horse.
Instead, its one of a long line of "scareware" or "rogueware,"
terms that apply to fake -- hence "rogue" -- software that tries to
spook you -- that's the "scare" -- into paying for a worthless
program. The labels are usually slapped on phony security software
that claims a computer is heavily infected with worms, viruses and
other malware. Such software nags users with pervasive pop-ups and
fake alerts until they fork over the "registration" fee, which in
MacDefender's case ranges between $60 and $80.
The criminals monetize their work by collecting these fees.
And it's a profitable trade, at least where Windows scareware's
concerned. Back in 2008, SecureWorks, now owned by Dell, said that
some bad guys were making as much as $5 million a year shilling
scareware. So MacDefender isn't hacking my Mac? No. Although
scareware targeting Windows has been known to silently plant itself
on PCs after other malware first exploits a security vulnerability
in the OS or other software, MacDefender doesn't. That's a possible
future move, of course, assuming attackers spend the time digging
up an unpatched vulnerability in, say, Mac OS X or a browser like
Safari or Firefox, and then write an exploit.
So how do Macs get infected with things like MacDefender?
Easy, they dupe users into doing the job for them. This video shows
how the Mac scareware scam works. (Video: Intego.) The group behind
MacDefender entices victims to malicious sites, where a Web page
that looks like the Mac Finder appears, runs a phony virus scan,
then claims that the machine is infected with dozens of Trojans.
When the unsuspecting user clicks the "OK" button, MacDefender
downloads to the Mac. Such social engineering-style attacks are
commonplace on Windows, but have been rare on Macs. Looks like that
party is over. Okay, so I fell for the ruse. What happens next?
Once it's downloaded, MacDefender automatically pops up an install
screen on Macs where Safari is running.
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If you used another browser to download the scareware --
Firefox or Chrome, for instance -- the criminals rely on you to
find the just-obtained installation package in the browser's
download destination and click on it. Next you'll see a typical Mac
installation process. (In earlier versions you had to enter your
administrator password, but that requirement's been eliminated in
the most recent version, dubbed "MacGuard.") Once MacDefender's
fooled you into installing it, the scareware runs another scan and
drops numerous alerts on the screen, all part of the scam to make
you think your Mac is infected. To remove the "infections," you
have to pay up by entering your credit card information. I'm not
completely stupid ... I just won't pay up. What happens then?
MacDefender -- which also goes by names like MacSecurity,
MacProtector and now, MacGuard -- duns you with those irritating
pop ups, flashes an icon in the menu bar, and worst of all, opens
pornographic pages in your browser every few minutes.
That last is a new twist to spur you to pay for the
scareware. "We think they're doing this because most people will
assume that that means they've got a virus on their Mac, and they
need to get rid of it by paying for the program," said Peter James
of Mac-only security software maker Intego in an interview earlier
this month. MacDefender automatically runs each time you start your
Mac, so you can't get rid of it by restarting or shutting down the
machine. So it's here to stay? Isn't there a way to get rid of it?
Yes, you can scrub your Mac manually. Earlier this week, Apple
finally acknowledged the MacDefender scareware campaign by posting
a support document on its site. That document spells out the
removal steps you should take.
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Can't the Mac remove this itself? Not yet. But Apple's
promised an update to Mac OS X 10.6, aka Snow Leopard, that will.
"In the coming days, Apple will deliver a Mac OS X software update
that will automatically find and remove MacDefender malware and its
known variants." Apple said in the support document it published
Tuesday. "The update will also help protect users by providing an
explicit warning if they download this malware." Only Snow Leopard
has rudimentary antivirus capabilities, which can warn users of a
small number of threats. That same feature can also quarantine
already-downloaded files that it deems dangerous. But Apple seems
to be saying that it will add a cleaning tool to Snow Leopard that
can scrub an already infected Mac. If so, that would be a first.
And it would mean that Apple would be following in the footsteps of
Microsoft, which has offered free cleaning tools -- notably the
Malicious Software Removal Tool, or MSRT -- for years. MSFT is
updated at least once each month, then pushed to customers via the
Windows Update service.
People running older versions of Mac OS X, including 10.5,
aka Leopard and 10.4, the even older Tiger, presumably will be on
their own.