For years, Apple users have crowed about their operating system’s lack of viruses, never thinking that the reason why Apples were virus free was based mostly on lack of install base rather than lack of ways to infect the system. After all, if given proper motivation, Apple computers are easy targets for hackers. Just like any other computer, Apple’s software is full of exploits and bugs, and now that Apple’s popularity is up, the hackers are coming for Jobs and company.
The first Apple virus in the wild is called iBotnet, and in this case, if you’ve installed a pirated copy of iWork onto your machine, you might have infected yourself (though you deserve it for stealing). While it has only infected a few thousand computers so far, it should put a shiver down the back of any Macolyte who doesn’t maintain an antivirus program on their machine. Your Apple can be poisoned.
As always, keep your computer patched (and hope that Apple will close their security holes a little more quickly than they have in the past). Be careful what you download and where you download from. Have an antivirus program, keep it up to date, and make sure you run it regularly to keep your machine clean. You know, pretend you’re a PC user and browse suspiciously.
These days, you can’t be too careful, and no one is safe anymore.
Image: Neatorama
Technorati Tags: apple, Apple's first virus, iBotnet, macintosh, trojan horse, virusesAdd to:
I’m amazed it’s taken this long–usually something like Apple’s “neener-neener-you-get-viruses-and-we-don’t”-style ads would be all it took to get a hacker motivated. They must be getting slow in their old age or something.
Posted by: Jade | April 24th, 2009 2:36 pm |
Well, I think there’s a difference between an individual hacker, who can get into any PC, and someone scripting viruses for use in this kind of botnet enterprise. In a botnet, you want as much reach as possible, so programming for a Mac was just too much effort for too little reward.
Posted by: Ron Hogan | April 27th, 2009 11:48 pm |