“Spyware and keystroke loggers have often been thought of as a Windows only problem, but Nicholas Raba, CEO of SecureMac.com and co-author of Maximum Security says many Apple Macintosh users may have a false sense of security. SecureMac has released MacScan which detects and removes Macintosh spyware, remote administration utilities and keystroke loggers. In a telephone interview, Raba talked to us about current and future Macintosh spyware and virus threats,” Humphrey Cheung writes for TG Daily.
Cheung writes, “MacScan, one of the few Macintosh anti-spyware programs, was released in 2002 and recently reached version 2.0. It currently recognizes, quarantines and deletes dozens of spyware programs and keystroke loggers and Raba adds, “And I’m not talking about cookies. You’ll see that other anti-spyware programs classify browser cookies as spyware.” The program is freely downloadable for a 15 day free trial. Afterwards, a perpetual license is $24.95. With a booth at the upcoming Macworld in San Franscisco and a retail push, Raba wants MacScan to become a household name like Ad-Aware or Symantec.”
Cheung writes, “People who are frustrated with computer viruses and spyware are constantly told to buy a Macintosh, but Raba told us that this just gives them a false sense of security. ‘Sure it may be one of the more secure operating systems, but you can’t go with the attitude that there are no viruses for the Mac,’ says Raba. He adds that proof of concept virus code is already running around the Internet and that a major Mac virus is inevitable. ‘Anyone with programming skills could make something, the majority don’t bother because they don’t want to go to jail,'” says Raba.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: There are zero Mac OS X viruses. Surely there are better ways to promote your product, Mr. Raba? You want to become to “become a household name like Symantec?” Well, you’ve certainly started down the right path to becoming as poorly-regarded as is Symantec by Mac users worldwide. Why are you talking about viruses when your product promises only to “detect, isolate, and remove: spyware, keystroke loggers, trojan horses, and administration applications?” What’s next, galoshes for earthworms, just $24.95 a pair?
Advertisements:
• The New iPod with Video. The ultimate music & video experience on the go. From $299. Free shipping.
• Connect iPod to your television set with the iPod AV Cable. Just $19.00.
• The New iMac G5. Built-in camera and remote control. From $1299. Free shipping.
• Apple USB Modem. Easily connect to the Internet using your dial-up service. $49.00.
Related MacDailyNews articles:
Why pay Symantec for flawed ‘security’ app designed to protect Apple Macs from nonexistent threats? – December 27, 2005
‘Highly critical’ flaw in discovered in Symantec AntiVirus for Mac OS X – December 21, 2005
Why Symantec’s ‘scare tactics’ don’t worry Mac users – September 28, 2005
$500 bounty offered for proof of first Apple Mac OS X virus – September 27, 2005
Symantec details flaws in its antivirus software – March 30, 2005
Motley Fool writer: ‘I’d be surprised if Symantec ever sells a single product to a Mac user again’ – March 24, 2005
Symantec cries wolf with misplaced Mac OS X ‘security’ warning – March 23, 2005
Symantec’s Mac OS X claims dismissed as nonsense, FUD – March 22, 2005
Symantec warns about Mac OS X security threat – March 21, 2005
Yeah, speaking of viruses, did you see the latest one making the rounds lately? It jumps into a fully patched and updated Windows XP system, just by clicking on a freaking link.
http://blogs.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2005/12/exploit_release.html
“Security researchers have released instructions for exploiting a previously unknown security hole in Windows XP and Windows 2003 Web Server with all of the latest patches applied.
Anti-virus company Symantec warned of the new exploit, which it said uses a vulnerability in the way Windows computers process certain image files (Windows Meta Files, or those ending in .wmf).
Symantec said the exploit is designed to download and run a program from the Web that downloads several malicious files, including tools that attackers could use to control vulnerable computers via Internet relay chat (IRC) channels.”
Nice Guy writes: “A lot of Mac user pass files to and from PC users, I use Anti-Virus as a courtesy to people using Windows, even if they do use Windows.”
This is a bit like trying to protect people from lung cancer and heart disease by buying up lots of cigarettes. It doesn’t really solve the problem, and you are the one who suffers.
You might think you’re being nice by not passing along Windoze viruses, but i assure you even if every Mac user did as you do, it would hardly faze the onslaught of Windoze viruses.
You can’t protect all the fools in this world from their own folly. Don’t try. If someone is stupid enough to run Windoze, let them waste their time and CPU cycles. Why should you pay to upgrade your computer to faster model so you can run Windoze Anti-Virus software? Or said another way: Why should you give up performance for the sake of Windoze heads?
If someone wants to do something self-destructive, be it smoke cigarettes or use Windoze, you probably can’t do anything about it. Unless they don’t know that what they’re doing is harmful (in which case, education is what will help them, not smoking the cigarette on their behalf).
Does MacScan remove the only known Trojan for MacOS X: Symantec Anti-Virus?
Just asking!
Just went through quite a few of the forum posts at SecureMac.com, looking for ANYONE saying thanks for MacScan detecting ANYTHING. Not one post about anyone finding anything, but several saying it didn’t find anything, and a few questions & complaints about it not running properly.
Course, we all knew that anyway.
Errrr, ‘Jesus’ and ‘sn’ –
The only known keylogger for OS X is Spector – a commercial product that requires installation and root access (automatic or remote installation is not possible). Just to be clear, it can’t be spread via the web…
See here for more info:
http://www.spectorsoft.com/index.html?UK=true
Jake – don’t be an ignorant tool. It’s proof of concept only. If we (or any group we work with) is successful, Apple will be the first to hear about it.
I *only* use OSX, so it’s not like I want to release something into the wild that kill my platform of choice.
Get a clue.
– Angry Munkee
NORTON ANTIVIRUS ALLOWS TAKEOVER OF MACS!!!
http://www.zdnetindia.com/insight/commentary/stories/132034.html
The headline is grossly incorrect. Even Raba doesn’t make the clain his product detects viruses. It supposedly removes spyware.
Please fix the headline, MDN.
We keep reading vague reports that viruses are key loggers for OS X are somewhere out there, but not widely seen.
Perhaps MDN can offer a feature where anybody who can name or describe an OS X virus or a key logger can post details to one central listing. MDN could offer comments about just how much we need to worry about them.
I’d like to claim the honour of being the first to list one, but unfortunately I don’t know of one, nor have I heard of one from any credible source.
Just for laugh I downloaded it, ran a full scan, Resaults 0.0000000 peices of SpyWare found, then trashed it.
Rainy Day …
“…..Does MacScan remove the only known Trojan for MacOS X: Symantec Anti-Virus?…..”
It would seem so …
Just because I was bored… I downloaded this thing from MacUpdate ..
And I ran their program…
Guess what ??
According to their program … I have absolutely NO spyware on my Mac …
ZERO … ZILCH …. NADA !!
This tells me two things …
• There isnt any spyware “in the wild” which affects OSX ..
and most importantly
• I dont need to waste $25 on their software !!
Now…. I gotta find out how to un-install this thing !
What a joke this guy is! Spyware and viruses for the Mac platform? We Mac users will never feel the same self-inflicted pain that Winbloze users experience day in and day out. Unless, of course, you count the time we spend helping clean up the PC systems of our friends and family, like the 6 hours I spent today cleaning the 589 spyware programs, 2 viruses, and 5 trojans off my brothers computer. I told him never again. He either gets a Mac or suffers through ordeals like that by himself.
Tough love baby – that’s the only way to get people to see the light!
A man gets on a bus and sits down beside a guy who is wadding up pieces of paper and throwing them out the window.
The man watches this for awhile, and finally asks “Why are you throwing paper out the window?”
The guy said, “to keep the elephants away.”
The man said, “There are no elephants around here!”
Guy: “You see, it works.”
I ran a Virex scan on my Mac and found this:
/Users/rohanferguson/Library/Caches/Java Applets/cache/javapi/v1.0/jar/dialarch.jar-571971d9-14226cd8.zip/INSECURECLASSLOADER.CLASS
Found the Exploit-ByteVerify trojan!
Scan of “/Users/rohanferguson/Library” completed.
Total files: 12659
7 possible infection(s).
7 infection(s) not repaired.
There is a lot more of the same but I don’t want to bore you all.
I also ran Mac Scan in trial mode and it didn’t find it al all. They won’t be getting my $25.
The Virex data base says the trojan is low risk?
Anyone know how I can get rid of it?
Ferg
Trojan.ByteVerify is a Trojan Horse that exploits the vulnerability described in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS03-011 and could provide a hacker the ability to run arbitrary code on an infected system.
Also Known As:Exploit-ByteVerify [McAfee], Exploit.Java.Bytverify [KAV], JAVA_BYTVERIFY.A [Trend]
Type:Trojan Horse
Infection Length:various
Systems Affected:Windows 2000, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT, Windows XP
Systems Not Affected:Linux, Macintosh, OS/2, UNIX
CVE References:CAN-2003-0111
Erase the file.
Dogfriend, cheers for that.
Are you saying I should deleve the seven files it is infecting?
Fergy
Yes, that is what they recommend at Symantec. Delete the files that are identified by the scan.
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/trojan.byteverify.html
Dogfriend,
Cheers for that. Much appreciated.
Sorry for taking so long to answer. had a few things to do.
Fergy
Hi all,
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/17436
If you follow the above link, you’ll see that MacScan does indeed have some problems.
BUT, you’ll also notice that one poster provides a very long list of keystroke-recording apps that he downloaded while testing MacScan — obviously there are keystroke-recorders that work in OS X!
Now, is there such an app that would be able to install without a user’s permission — that’s a different issue! :~)
The Linkster
I just downloaded the trial and put a couple keybaord loggers and simple spyware programs that dont even try and hide themselfes and were both running you could even see them in activity moniter and the stupid program couldnt detect the process’s or the files. Whatever u do do not buy this software, if there were virus’s for the mac in the first place this program would not to find it, the only good thing about this application is the scan does not take a long time when scanning a 80gig on a G4 iBook.So it is not a major CPU user luckilly.
Java is a security risk. I always turn it off in any browser i run.
Note: Javascript is not the same thing, btw.
Coming up next:
Sasquatch repellant for OSX!
Even though my Mac isn’t at risk, I share files with friends that (unfortunately for them) own windoze machines. To help them keep their machines safe, and to keep from passing viruses to them, I use an anti-virus product on my Mac. Just seems like the right thing to do.
Does MacScan remove the SunComm MediaMax kernel extensions that shipped on Sony copy-protected CDs?
Steve, stop being a retard. It makes me sad.