You may think that you are safer working on a Mac. Learn if this “fact” is true.
A lot of people believe that they are safer running a Mac computer as opposed to Windows but this is certainly not true. In fact, according to McAfee Labs, malware attacks on Apple’s Mac computers were up 744% in 2016, and it’s researchers have discovered nearly 460,000 Mac malware samples, which is still just a small part of overall Mac malware out in the wild.
A Malware research team at CheckPoint have discovered a new, fully-undetectable Mac virus which can affect all versions of Mac OS x. The scary part is that it is signed with a valid developer certificate which was authenticated by Apple.
It is called DOK and it’s distributed via email and seems to be the first major scale malware to target Mac computers.
It is designed to gain administrative privileges and install a new root certificate on the target system. Its goal is to allow the attacker to intercept and gain complete access to your encrypted traffic.
This traffic could be your banking transactions, your email or anything else that can ride on HTTPS:// secure web traffic.
Apple has since revoked the certificate used by DOK and they have also issued a new security update to its XProtect built-in anti-malware software in an attempt to prevent existing and future DOC-type malware attacks.
Email is still one one of the biggest ways that hackers gain access to computers. Remember these tips to reduce the risk of your computer being overtaken.
- Don’t open emails from unknown or untrusted people.
- Be wary of links that have been sent to you, even from people you DO trust.
- Hackers are incredibly good at disguising their emails to look like trusted sources. If you get an email from a bank, or the government, or iTunes and it contains a link, hover your mouse over the link to reveal the destination. Scrutinize that link, and make sure that it is exactly going back to the source and not something that looks “close enough.”
- Make sure you have the latest in anti-virus and anti-spam programs.
You can’t be too careful. Be critical of anything you receive in your inbox.
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Sources: The Hacker News http://thehackernews.com/2017/04/apple-mac-malware.html
