Apple Releases Update for Flashback Virus

Story first appeared in The Huffington Post

Apple has followed through with its promise to develop software that will detect and remove the malicious Mac Flashback trojan, which infected more than 600,000 Mac laptops worldwide.

On April 12, the company released yet another Java update that removes the most common variants of the Flashback malware. While the update is meant only for OS X Lion and Mac OS X v10.6, Apple suggested previously that users with Macs running Mac OS X v10.5 or earlier disable Java in order to better protect their devices from the Flashback trojan.

When the company on April 10 announced it would be developing a malware removal tool, Apple also mentioned it is currently working with Internet service providers (ISPs) across the world to shut down the network of computer servers presumably hosted by the malware authors and currently supporting the Flashback trojan.

This is Apple's third software update to Java in nine days; however, this latest update release is the first one actually designed to detect and remove the Flashback trojan from Mac laptop devices, as well as patch up the Java vulnerabilities of which the trojan took advantage.

According to PCMag, another function of the update is to disable the Java plugin on all Web browsers (not just Safari) and turn off applet execution by default. In addition, Apple explained in its support document for the Java update, "Users may re-enable automatic execution of Java applets using the Java Preferences application. If the Java web plug-in detects that no applets have been run for an extended period of time it will again disable Java applets."

The Flashback trojan has been around in various forms since last September, but it wasn't until recently that it seemed to become a huge problem, prompting Java developer Oracle to release a security update back in February.

While Apple has been criticized for its slow response to the Flashback trojan, at least it seems its Java security updates have been working.

On April 12, ZDNet reported the results of a study conducted by security software developer Symantec, which found that the number of infected Macs has dropped to around 270,000 from more than 600,000 just last week.

Then again, it's just as likely the drop in infected devices is due to increasing awareness of the Flashback trojan's existence and to the release of tools to fight the malware by such Internet security companies as F-Secure, Symantec and Dr. Web, the firm that first discovered just how widely the trojan had spread back on April 4.


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Clean Up Your Mac and Protect From Viruses

Story first appeared in The Washington Post.

For years, Mac users have been able to believe that they are safer than the average computer user and turned their noses up at antivirus software. But as Apple’s market share has grown, so has the threat to Mac users’ security.

Last week, a Russian-based security company called Dr. Web reported that up to 600,000 Macs appeared to be part of a growing botnet, mostly in the United States and in Canada. Security researchers are referring to the virus as Flashback.

A senior security researcher at ZScaler, said that while he can’t confirm Dr. Web’s numbers, the conditions sound right for a malware problem of that scale. The virus should be a wake-up call to those who still think that their Mac is invulnerable to attacks like this, he said.  Macs are not impenetrable to threats-those threats do exist.

Macs were particularly affected in this attack because of a vulnerability in the Apple version of Java — the company stopped using Oracle’s releases of Java a couple of years ago, and supports its own versions. Yet while Oracle had patched the problem with Java that caused this problem months ago, Apple had yet to address the problem until April 3, when it issued a patch for the vulnerability. It then released a second patch on April 5.

Several experts have said that this appears to be one of the largest-ever attacks on Macs.

To improve Mac security in the future, it is recommended that users keep updated versions of Java as they come and automate their computers to check for security updates regularly.

He also recommended that users who have yet to do so bite the bullet and install some kind of antivirus software on their Mac, which should also clean up any machine that’s been infected. If you want to check if you’ve been infected without downloading anti-virus software, the security firm F-Secure has instructions for a good, if technical, way to do so.

There are, of course, also some practices that users can use to minimize the likelihood of infection. For one, don’t click on links in e-mails that you’re not absolutely sure have come from someone you trust. The same goes for opening attachments. If a URL looks suspect, don’t click on it no matter how “hilarious” a video is said to be. Don’t believe promises from ads that sound too good to be true and don’t agree to download any software that you didn’t specifically set out to find.

Finally, any time you’re putting personal, particularly financial, information into a form online, make sure that you see an “https” at the start of the Web address. If you don’t see it, there’s a chance you’ve been redirected to a fake site, particularly if the signal that you’re on a secure server has been there before. Try typing in the address of the Web site you want again — don’t hit refresh — or try an alternate method of getting what you want done.

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