Well it had to happen sometime.
I looks like there is a trojan (properly named) out there in the wild. It only seems to affect patrons of porn sites. It goes like this: you want to look at a video and you are asked to download the proper codec. You say ‘yes’ and download an installer that mounts itself and asks for your password. You give the password and it changes your dns settings and sends you on a wild ride around the internet. Oh yeah, it also sends itself to people on your buddy list in iChat or AOL. Fun.
Symantec is calling this a ‘worm’. Although it displays worm-like behavior once it’s installed, you have to grant it the privilege of running on your machine; and that, my friends, is a trojan. Whatever the name, everyone should know better than to download and install things from untrusted sources.
I can see where this exploit could confuse people. If the trojan called itself Adobe Flash, few people would think to go to Adobe’s site, to see if they had the latest version of Flash and get it from there. Instead people might have heard of Flash so they’d be tempted to install it. This is dangerous.
I’ve sent out warnings to my clients so that they understand that part of what I do is keeping them current, or at least one generation behind cutting edge, anyway. Hopefully, they’ll trust me and not do something stupid.
At any rate, Windows users can rejoice that some Mac users who live with a false sense of security are now actually being targeted. I just want to make sure that everyone who knows me and uses Macs, knows to be more careful and smart enough to know that no system of ones and zeros can ever be completely safe.