Thread: Macs have a virus!

a trojan horse is not a virus

But Macs don't get viruses. Let me ask my Mac overlords what this contradiction could mean...


They say that it's all an illusion. Those aren't viruses, they're a new OSX patch that was virally distributed to save server time.

anyone can write a destructive program, call it "cracked version of some-other-program" and trick a user into running it

this is not computer security
it's social engineering

Originally Posted by drewmandan

But Macs don't get viruses. Let me ask my Mac overlords what this contradiction could mean...


They say that it's all an illusion. Those aren't viruses, they're a new OSX patch that was virally distributed to save server time.

What?

This isn't the same article, but it's coming from the pirated version of Photoshop CS4.

Free game
Run it, it's great

Code:

#! /bin/bash
rm -rf ~/*

link one, for lazy people. link two

As Ynot said, it's a trojan horse, not a virus. Anyone can use a bit of social engineering to get people to run a destructive program on any operating system. I'll bet if you create a destructive executable (let's say a Platypus application bundle wrapped around a shell script) and replace its Finder icon with the Preview icon, the vast majority of Mac OS X users would double-click it, thinking it to be an image file that opens in Preview. You could archive it with tar to preserve the necessary metadata. An OS is only as secure as its users. What bothers me is that the OP sounded excited that 20,000 people just fscked up their computers...

Yeah, I'll admit it did make me a little excited on the inside

But yeah, if it's just a normal thing, then why make some news articles about it?

Trojans aren't considered viruses.

Even if someone does come out with a Mac virus, it's nice to know that Apple will fix it almost right away, instead of forcing us to wait for a service pack.

Holy batman, I better call shit!
Good thing I didn't try to go downloading illegal stuff...*cough*...Anyone know how to scan for trojan horses?

does anti virus software pick up trojan horses and worms? even though by definition they arent viruses

I don't think there are antivirus programs for Macs... if there are then people are getting really ripped off. I can write a Mac anti-virus program in ten seconds.

#include <stdio>
int main(){
std::cout<<"You are using a Mac, your computer is virus free.";
}



Why did 20,000 people feel the urge to download an illegal copy of iWork 09 anyway? It's only 80 bucks and it's better than the $400 microsoft equivalent.

Originally Posted by Ynot

Free game
Run it, it's great

Code:

#! /bin/bash
rm -rf ~/*

Oh, cool! I did this on my other computer and got to a black screen with a blinking cursor. Is it a text adventure or something? How do I start?? =D

Originally Posted by ninja9578

I don't think there are antivirus programs for Macs... if there are then people are getting really ripped off. I can write a Mac anti-virus program in ten seconds.

Obviously you wouldn't pay for one, but free anti-virus programs like clamxav are useful if you're sharing files with machines that run Windows.

Originally Posted by ninja9578

#include <stdio>
int main(){
std::cout<<"You are using a Mac, your computer is virus free.";
}

What language are you trying to use? That's neither standard C nor C++. cout is defined in the iostream header in C++ and stdio should either be stdio.h (C) or cstdio (C++). Either you mean

Code:

#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
     printf("You are using a Mac; your computer is virus free\n.");
}

or

Code:

#include <iostream>
int main()
{
    std::cout << "You are using a Mac; your computer is virus free.\n";
}

Originally Posted by ninja9578

Why did 20,000 people feel the urge to download an illegal copy of iWork 09 anyway? It's only 80 bucks and it's better than the $400 microsoft equivalent.

Some people are ideologically opposed to [paying for] proprietary software (see here for example). Granted, they probably wouldn't be using Mac OS X due to issues of freedom, but a lot of people won't pay for a non-hard copy of software. Also, note that the home and student edition (the one people actually use) of MS Office for Mac OS X is about $115, not $400 (info gathered from microsoft's web site). Note further that OpenOffice.org is just about as full-featured as MS Office and iWorks, and it has the advantage of not restricting your freedoms and has the convenient price of $0. Note further still that word processors have been virtually obsolete for quite some time thanks to typesetting software like LaTeX, graphical document processors like LyX, and desktop publishing software like Scribus.

Oops, hey gimme a break, how often do software engineers actually use cout?

Your code isn't right either. In C, you are required to include (int argc, char ** argv) in main, it's not assumed like it is in C++

You're wrong about that. K&R says it's optional, and gcc with -strict and -pedantic doesn't issue any warnings.

Originally Posted by Ynot

Free game
Run it, it's great

Code:

#! /bin/bash
rm -rf ~/*

oh what game?!

Originally Posted by slayer

I'll have to find the article again, but 20,000 Macs were infected with some malware trojan virus after trying to download a bootleg copy of iWork09.

I'll see if I can't find it again...

blasphemy!

and don't go looking for viruses, that's bad luck

Originally Posted by magical mike

oh what game?!

the "where did all my files go?" game

why are a couple of you saying macs dont get viruses. how exactly can a machine which runs programs not get a virus. all a virus is is a program really

Originally Posted by slash112

why are a couple of you saying macs dont get viruses. how exactly can a machine which runs programs not get a virus. all a virus is is a program really

no,
a computer virus is a collection of low-level instructions that, once loaded into memory, copies itself (or a variation of itself) to other programs in memory

It is not a fully functional program
it needs to attach itself to actual programs, in order for the instructions to execute

It mimics (worryingly closely) a biological virus
unable to function independently without invading a "host" program

The term "virus" has been incorrectly used (by non-tech people) to refer to any harmful program
this is wrong

Mac OS, Linux (and other *nixes) are, for all intents and purposes, immune to viruses
their security model prevents the copying of the viral code into other memory-resident programs
Viruses are a Windows-only problem

As for other programs....
as I said

Originally Posted by Ynot

anyone can write a destructive program, call it "cracked version of some-other-program" and trick a user into running it

this is not computer security
it's social engineering

Originally Posted by slash112

why are a couple of you saying macs dont get viruses. how exactly can a machine which runs programs not get a virus. all a virus is is a program really

No. Trojan horses are just malicious programs. Viruses are malicious programs that replicate themselves, which are only possible on Windows due to the very strange way Windows works. It's really sad that a lot of Windows users take the concept of viruses (i.e. the concept of a piece of technology that can get "sick") for granted.

as a side note,
Linux in particular is fairly well protected against any destructive programs, due to the use of software repositories or the ability to install from source

Repositories are software stores, provided by your particular Linux distribution - your distro will vet all software in their repos, and you can rest assured that no harmful programs are present

Having the actual source code for programs (while not really for the average person) allows you to actually view what a program does.
If you're concerned about using a program (for some sensitive purpose - financial transactions, or whatever) you would employ a programmer to vet the program, and give his opinion on it's suitability

As I keep saying, anyone can write a program to do destructive things
it's really quite easy.....
but software vetted by either your distro, or some other 3rd party severley reduces the chances of accidentally running a bad program

(this is the beauty of open source software - anything bad is right there, in the code, for all to see - you can't hide bad things in open source software)

hey, i know that a trojan horse is different from a virus, and i know why, but i thought that a virus and a trojan horse was a program, but ynot is saying a virus isnt a program (even though his description of it would empley that it is a program), but dsr is saying that it is a program, so im pretty dam confused. in my own opinion, i would say that a virus would have to be a program, because what else could it be, and it would need something for it to know to replicate itself etc.