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Apple released a new security patch yesterday to stop the dreaded MacDefender malware that has caused a plethora of issues for Macintosh owners. Only a short while later however a new version was released which bypasses Apple's security patch.
The trojan is incorporated within a pkg file called mdinstall – this installs a program called MacGuard, code which yet again pretends to be security software the end user needs to cure a problem it in fact causes. A combination of clever attacks on Google, Facebook and other social networking sites have tricked many mac users into installing similar rogue antivirus software.
The problem was so widespread and high profile that Apple intervened directly to patch OSX into stopping MacDefender before it can be installed. Sadly for Apple, the malicious coders worked out how to bypass the security patch within a couple of hours.
The new code has been designed to easily bypass Apple's new security protection feature. This is not a new thing for Windows users, but clearly the Macintosh is now a viable platform for malicious software and sneaky malware packages. How Apple will stay on top of it is anyone's guess, because this is new territory for the Cupertino hardware giant.
KitGuru says: Patch, new version, patch, new version. The game of cat and mouse has begun.
Oh dear, they seem so ill prepared for this.
Personally I hope for more of these attacks to continue (cant believe am actually saying this as I am using a Mac Pro). Its high time Apple’s vulnerability got exposed. you see their sales guys always harping on to customers saying “No viruses in a Mac like Windows”, now it isn’t so. Lets just hope a culmination of more events will prove they (OSX) are not invincible. At least that should drive the prices down albeit a little bit
Yep, this just goes to show how unprepared they are. They may lose customers over this since Apple support is not supposed to help with virses/trojan/malware or whatever you wanna call it.