“This week’s ‘Mac virus’ scare turned out to be nothing more than a worm for Mac OS X that propagates through iChat and infects local Mac applications. OSX/Leap.A is a wake up call to Mac users that we’re not immune to all the nasties floating around on the Web,” Jason D. O’Grady blogs for ZDNet. “There was a story circulating this week that The First Virus For Mac OS X had arrived, but it turned out to only be a relatively innocuous worm embedded in a file called “latestpics.tgz” promising pictures of ‘MacOS X Leopard.’ The worm required the user to download, decompress and execute the file then enter their admin password to cause any damage.”
O’Grady writes, “The first rule of software downloads is obvious: never open a file or attachment from someone that you don’t know. The second is that if it’s too good to be true it probably is. If a download promises you screen shots of Mac OS 10.5 “Leopard” don’t believe it (after all, why not just post the pics?) but never, ever enter your Mac OS X admin password to install something from an unknown source, especially if you downloaded it surreptitiously.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Tsk, tsk. So much ado about nothing. The old rules still apply: do not enter your Mac OS X admin password to install anything from an unknown and/or untrusted source.
MacDailyNews Note: We have been affected by a widespread power outage as a result of Friday’s windstorms in the U.S. northeast. We lost power at approximately 9:30am EST yesterday along with approximately 250,000 others. The blackout is still affecting over 120,000 residences and businesses as of this post. Due to our backups currently being unavailable due to other circumstances, we have driven out of the affected area in order to resume posts. The power company curently reports that they expect power to be restored by “Sunday night at the latest.” Thank you for your patience.
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Related MacDailyNews articles:
Apple: ‘Leap-A’ not a virus; only accept files from vendors and Web sites that you know and trust – February 16, 2006
Incorrect reports of ‘Mac OS X virus’ begin to circulate – February 16, 2006
New Mac OS X Trojan warning – February 16, 2006
