“Less than a day after Apple released a new security update nuking Mac Defender from orbit, a new variant has appeared that skirts around the protections of the update,” John Brownlee reports for Cult of Mac. “Called Mdinstall.pkg, this variant hit the scenes especially fast: with a time stamp of 9:24PM Pacific Time, the Mac Defender malware evolved within eight hours time.”
“This shouldn’t be a huge deal,” Brownlee reports. “The latest security update also included new functionality that allows OS X’s anti-malware definition file to update itself without manually downloading and applying a security patch, so Mdinstall.pkg will probably only have a shelf life of a day or less before Apple nukes this variant too.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Here’s our usual reminder for Mac users and anyone who’s trying to use any other platform: Do not download and authorize the installation of applications (Trojans) from untrusted sources. No OS can protect users from themselves (or we wouldn’t be able to install any software). Those who grant attackers access to their computers, should not be surprised to find their computers are compromised.
Related articles:
Apple releases Security Update 2011-003 (Snow Leopard); blocks and removes MACDefender trojan – May 31, 2011
Apple: How to avoid or remove MACDefender malware (permanent fix coming in Mac OS X update) – May 24, 2011
MACDefender trojan protection and removal guide – May 20, 2011
Apple investigating ‘MACDefender’ trojan – May 19, 2011
Apple malware: 6 years of crying wolf – May 6, 2011
Is Mac under a virus attack? No. – May 4, 2011
Intego: MACDefender rogue anti-malware program attacks Macs via SEO poisoning – May 2, 2011