Mac Trojan Horse warning!

Thanks for the heads up.

That's right ladies and gentlemen, if you download an application from an untrusted source and type in your admin password to give it sudo privileges, you may be at risk.

I have feared the emergence of a new trojan horse for some time now. We really haven't had one since CPro141, which was around 1993. Other notable ones of ages past include Font Finder, Mosaic, Steroid, Tetricycle, and Sexy Ladies.

Always be safe when dealing with your downloaded applications. The threat is much greater now than it was in the early 1990s because of the popularity of the internet.

Also, I applaud the folks who got the news published so quickly. It used to take a long time for virus reports to be written...and they were usually about the umpteenth strain of nVIR back then.

The threat is much greater now than it was in the early 1990s because of the popularity of the internet.

Yes...and no. The potential for infection is greater, but as bDub points out, the probability is still low. Unlike with the old OS 9 viruses, you've got to give it admin rights before it can do anything.

Also, I applaud the folks who got the news published so quickly. It used to take a long time for virus reports to be written...and they were usually about the umpteenth strain of nVIR back then.

My take on it is the PC-centric media couldn't wait to kill OS X's 'no viruses' record. Symantec will probably be happy, too.

The threat is much greater now than it was in the early 1990s because of the popularity of the internet.

Yes...and no. The potential for infection is greater, but as bDub points out, the probability is still low. Unlike with the old OS 9 viruses, you've got to give it admin rights before it can do anything.

You can still wipe out your home directory without admin rights, as well as modify any applications stored in home.

It's certainly not a big techincal accomplishment, though. Put "rm -rf ~/*" in a script, name it SecretMacPrototypes, and you've got a trojan.

Did apple have Microsoft write iChat for them??

It's still got the "no viruses" record though. This is a lot like the "proof of concept" trojans that made the buzz a couple years ago. A lot of hype over something that's been "possible" all along, but is something htat anybody should be able to see coming a mile away.

Root kits and trojans still aren't a virus, for those reading who got scared. You aren't going to pick something up in you main OS unless you do something stupid, like give a program your admin password when it shouldn't need it.