“The federal US computer security watchdog has issued a warning about a bug in Apple’s OS X operating system,” BBC News reports. “The US Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US Cert) issued the alert after security researchers produced code that could exploit the DMG bug. The flaw involves the way OS X handles disk images and could be used to crash or take over a vulnerable machine.”
The Beeb reports, “So far the DMG bug has only been shown to work under laboratory conditions and has not been seen in the wild…The bug has only been proved to work under laboratory conditions. No cases of it being exploited in the wild are known and no users are thought to be at risk. The availability of the exploit code might tempt some malicious hackers to craft webpages that take advantage of it… Users of Apple Mac computers are far less likely to suffer security problems because the vast majority of viruses are written to exploit Microsoft’s Windows operating system. There are also differences in the way that OS X works which help to prevent malicious code taking hold.”
The Beeb reports, “Apple has yet to provide a fix for the DMG bug though a workaround is known which should stop computers falling victim.”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Jamie” for the heads up.]
Since the BBC, in their finite wisdom, neglect to explain the extremely simple “workaround” solution, we fill in their blank here: In Safari’s Preferences, uncheck the “Open ‘Safe’ files after downloading” box.
Related articles:
Mac OS X/Safari DMG vulnerability reported: Turn off automatic opening of ‘safe’ files to prevent – November 21, 2006
Dear Apple:
I opened a dubious file from an unknown source. Now my computer doesn’t work. What should I do?
Dear BBC:
Get a brain and use common sense.
zzzzzzzz
BBC is a BS news source. They consistently report badly on news around the world.
I really wish people would write about tech issues in an accurate way. Not just about Apple but in general, the public are confused enough about technology that stuff like this doesn’t help one but. There is a genuine issue here, perhaps nothing major but still something people should know about, they should also know how bad it is, which at this stage is not very.
In other news, Pfizt’her has created a mutant virus in the lab, not in the wild, but there are concerns that if this virus, created in a lab, not in the wild, were to somehow get out, then people should get inoculated, which in a related story, the same team has devised a vaccine.
M.X.N.T.4.1,
The problem is that “tech” journalists don’t seem to really understand the subject of their reporting. The people who do understand it, however, are too busy creating the next best thing to become tech journalists.
I guess we’re stuck with what we’ve got :/
Equation! Zune Tang!
What would a PC user do in a case like this?
BBC proving again their Microsoft love affair. Macs what are they.
Check out this BBC interview with Woz. Interviewer seems to think Woz is an Apple executive!
The link to the recording is on this page.. the linke entitled “Apple Boss” http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/working_lunch/5170354.stm
You’ll love the style over substance question, and the one, ‘why isn’t Apple more like Microsoft’. If I’d have been Woz I’d have been on the news for having flattened the man…!
Incompetent BBC. Again. sigh
This news about Pfizt’her really has me worried. Suppose it gets out and the vaccine doesn’t work. We could all be in trouble.
DPlP
Pray that Smerck is on the job too.
The Beeb is anti-Mac. The problem with their Barbra Streisand is that Brits believe it. Here is the result of their poll.
Should Mac users worry about computer security?
Yes – 77.98%
No – 22.02%
5364 Votes Cast
Results are indicative and may not reflect public opinion
Mac users shouldn’t ‘worry’ about security, they should just not open a dubious file from an unknown source.
BBC and Microsoft sign agreement
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/5390000.stm
Yep, in bed together. Hardly ‘impartial’ and not good use of licence payers money either.
They say: “could be used to crash or take over a vulnerable machine”
Not what I heard! Close to the first, sort of like the second, not precisely either. The thing can cause a spin-til-reboot pinwheel of death. So … it causes the user to “crash” their system to make it go away. And … it “takes over” your disk-mount/dismount ability. This is seriously annoying stuff, particularly to a Mac user unused to such bothersome behavior!
DLMeyer – the Voice of G.L.Horton’s Stage Page
I unchecked that option a long time ago. when you download a couple of hundred files in one session you sure as hell don’t want all of them opened
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BBC outsourced their IT to Siemens:
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/itmanagement/0,1000000308,39167296,00.htm
and is in bed with Microsoft (I bet in a submissive role as well):
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/5390000.stm
with the Labour government standing next to the bed with the lubricant.
Basically, anything the BBC reports from a tech point of view can be ignored as pro-Microsoft and pro-PC monopoly FUD.
What would I do as a UK resident? I’d shut the BBC down and give the money back to the shareholders (i.e. me).
Oh but yeah, I’m not actually a ‘shareholder’ as such am I?.
I have to pay the yearly fee or face imprisonment and a fine, but I don’t actually ‘own’ the content that the BBC produce using MY licence fee.
It was hard enough to get hold of it before (it was in Real format). Now it’ll be coated in a nice, thick, sickly-sweet coating of Microsoft DRM, I can’t get at it at all.
Not that I want to, as most of it’s socialist-liberal propaganda, (BBC news), social-engineered kids TV to turn my poor kids into happy little submissive Labour voters (CBeebies), or mind-numbing, ‘keep-the-proles-nice-and-ignorant’ reality shows.
They do get to sell MY CONTENT to ‘BBC World’ however (who then sell it around the world), but do I get a dividend from this (seeing as it was paid for with MY MONEY)? I do not. Who get’s this cash? the treasury (i.e. government).
Sorry for the rant, but the BBC signify everything that’s wrong with the UK.
Unchecked Safari long ago, rightly so, it seems.
I’m curious to see if 10.5 has this feature disabled by default.
Ok, let’s get one thing straight. The BBC is not, repeat NOT, leftie, pinko, commie, liberal or in fact any other slur you might want to attach to it. It’s a government-owned station, whether that government is Labour or Conservative and has been since the 1920’s. Can we please move away from the slander and unnecessary name-calling when commenting on Mac-related subjects?
Whilst it’s true the BBC is very obviously Microsoft-slanted [this despite its creative departments all running Macs] and it tends poorly report on tech issues in general. Which is EXACTLY like almost all American mainstream media. In fact, with the honorable exception of David Pogue in the New York Times [and barely one or two others], most MSM ‘tech reporters’ are also MS-slanted.
Let’s keep politics out of this forum… especially when most of the posters know so little of what they speak, as noted above.
I really don’t understand all this bollocks about the BBC being anti-Apple. It posts more Apple-related news stories than any other regular news site I know. Just do a search and take a look:
http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/search/results.pl?tab=ns&q=apple&recipe=all&scope=all&edition=d
The fact it doesn’t shove it’s tongue up Job’s arse with every news item hardly makes it biased. It is also reporting to a general audience, most of whom can’t tell the difference between a mouse and a keyboard, so it’s no wonder they have to simplify the stories.
BBC dramas almost always feature Apple machines in the background – way more than Apple’s pitiful market share deserves. If the boot were on the other foot, and this was a Microsoft news site (which it often appears to be) then you can be sure we’d all be screaming about the disproportionate free advertising the BBC gives Apple in its programmes.
As for being politically biased, that’s also complete tosh. Given that both political sides regularly acuse it of bias, I’m quite happy it’s about as neutral as an organisation can be. This means I will inevitably disagree with some of its viewpoints: that’s a reflection of *my* bias, not its.
Just because a news channel does not take the “Fox News” line, doesn’t make it biased.
IMHO, the “Open ‘Safe’ files after downloading” box should be removed completely. There’s no such thing as a 100% certain “safe” file. Adding such a “convenience” is just asking for trouble.
Besides, you can click the little magnifying glass in the download window to go right to a file if you want to open it. Or just right-click on the download window and open the file from there.
Say what you will, the BBC definitely has a history of publishing tech reportage that is laden with unwarranted negative insinuation in regard to Apple. Mere speculative musings directly insinuating diminishing health for Apple’s reputation have been published as serious tech news headlines in the past. That’s just not respectable journalism. In actual fact, it’s dishonest and it’s dishonorable.
Reality Check: spot on. Especially about the “that’s a reflection of *my* bias, not its”.
Some of the BBC’s tech reporting is definitely a little dumbed-down and tending to pander to the Windoze-using majority, but that’s probably true of any popular reporting. I can’t comment as I don’t claim to have the same knowledge of, say, the political situation in Burma as I do of the Mac’s innate resistance to viruses. So – unlike others here – I won’t make the sweeping generalisation.
Funny.
When BBC knocks Zune, we all (here on MDN) sing their praises.
However, when they cause alarm for Macs, we respond maliciously.
AM I missing something here?
DW:
Despite Apple’s reluctance to correct this problem in Safari’s preferences and BBC’s legitimate reporting of it, this particular flaw in OS X has been known for years. Additionally, the problem is simple to correct and the solution has been widely published. It is always good practice never to open dubious files whether someone uses OS X or Windows. I doubt that BBC’s “breaking news” delivered years too late is a valid substitute for common sense and common knowledge. Folks here mock BBC because the reporting is irrelevant and dramatized, and these are not the hallmarks of professional journalism.
“What would a PC user do in a case like this?”
The PC user would click OK on the dialog box telling them that their antivirus software had blocked the file.
A Mac user would cry like a little girl as their supposedly invulnerable Mac crashed and rebooted. Then, because they wouldn’t believe that such a thing was possible, they’d click on the link again. After their Mac rebooted again, they’d go to website and trash the BBC for pointing out that their Mac wasn’t invulnerable.