RE: mac trojan in-the-wild

["David Harley" <david.a.harley () gmail com>]

> I disagree. Even if it was for a martian computer and 
> useless, AVs will detect it for the sake of detecting it. 
> Them not doing so is just another example of how useless the 
> AV *itself* is unfortunately becoming--more and more.

I'm not saying that AV isn't losing ground, but it's not really a
deterioration, in this case. Vendors who didn't have a Mac product never did
mess with Mac malware in the past, and I've -always- thought that was a Bad
Thing. (Some people with a gateway/external scanner did look at other
platforms, and kudos to them for that). Certainly an area in which most
vendors could/should do better. 

> This means one thing: Apple's day has finally come and Apple 
> users are going to get hit hard. All those unpatched 
> vulnerabilities from years past are going to bite them in the behind.

Early days. But this is starting to feel like the time when those of us
who've been saying "Macs are not invulnerable" since the early '90s can
start thinking about saying "told you so..." ;-)
 
> I can sum it up in one sentence:  OS X is the new Windows 98. 
> Investing in security ONLY as a last resort losses money, but 
> everyone has to learn it for themselves.

Good point. An interesting extrapolation: some may see a parallel between
the way OS X lost practically an entire generation of pre-X malware, and the
way Windows after 3.x became less vulnerable to earlier BSVs and file
viruses. What comes around, comes around...

--
David Harley
AVIEN Interim Administrator: http://www.avien.org 
http://www.smallblue-greenworld.co.uk  


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