The first Mac Trojan has been detected and makes harm on Macs

<h1>The first Mac Trojan has been detected and makes harm on Macs</h1>Author: <a title="Stig Kristoffersen" href="http://www.articlesbase.com/authors/stig-kristoffersen/34356.htm">Stig Kristoffersen</a> The first Mac Trojan has been detected and makes harm on Macs.   The first ever botnet consisting of Mac computers have been activated. This is maybe the final proof that the Mac OS is no longer a virus free platform. A botnet is a collection of computers that without the owners knowledge are connected over the internet. A computer gets infected by a virus, Trojan or other malicious software and becomes part of the botnet. This computer is from now a zombie in the botnet which is controlled by a group of cyber criminals through a sophisticated control system. This control system enables these persons behind the botnet to utilize the botnet for a variety of purposes. It could be as harmless to send spam email with offers to buy certain products, to more malicious tapping computers in the network or outside the network for vital information. The botnet is used by the cyber criminals mostly to steal personal information, send spam and viruses and to perform ddos attacks. A ddos attack lets a hacker use several machines  and bombard certain IP addresses with requests and essentially get that IP address to stop working and off the web. The first Trojans on the OS-X were detected in 2007, however almost none were infected by these. However, in early 2009 there were discovered Trojans in pirate copied software packages of iWork and Photoshop CS4. According to internet security company Intego as many as 20.000 computers were infected by this. Reports out there now indicate that a botnet consisting of Mac computers infected by these Trojans has been activated and begun to attack other systems outside the botnet. An Australian blogger discovered this by seeing his computer ran at full force without any activity from his side was needed. By closer examination he found a small program that kept on attacking a web server. A Trojan is not the same as a virus and you can not have it installed on your machine unless you perform an action to allow it to do so either. So far there is no reason to panic for the Mac users around the world as most Trojans are spread through pirate copied software, and if you stay away from these, you should be safer, however if the botnet increases in strength, it can reach your computer without you knowing it. Symantec experts is of the opinion that a modified version of this Trojan is likely to come in near future and will become a higher risk to Mac users. The Conficker based botnet is at the moment larger than 10 million windows based computers, and you should therefore be very restrictive running Windows on your Mac to avoid virus and Trojans.About the Author: He has a background as civil engineer and geoscientist. He has worked mainly within the oil and gas industry from the mid 1980s. He has written a few fictional novels as well as being the author of some professional litterature within oil and gas sector, he is now an editor of some web sites.Article Source: <a href="http://www.articlesbase.com/">ArticlesBase.com</a> - <a href="http://www.articlesbase.com/internet-articles/the-first-mac-trojan-has-been-detected-and-makes-harm-on-macs-911905.html" title="The first Mac Trojan has been detected and makes harm on Macs">The first Mac Trojan has been detected and makes harm on Macs</a>

The first Mac Trojan has been detected and makes harm on Macs.

The first ever botnet consisting of Mac computers have been activated.

This is maybe the final proof that the Mac OS is no longer a virus free platform.

A botnet is a collection of computers that without the owners knowledge are connected over the internet. A computer gets infected by a virus, Trojan or other malicious software and becomes part of the botnet. This computer is from now a zombie in the botnet which is controlled by a group of cyber criminals through a sophisticated control system. This control system enables these persons behind the botnet to utilize the botnet for a variety of purposes. It could be as harmless to send spam email with offers to buy certain products, to more malicious tapping computers in the network or outside the network for vital information.

The botnet is used by the cyber criminals mostly to steal personal information, send spam and viruses and to perform ddos attacks. A ddos attack lets a hacker use several machines and bombard certain IP addresses with requests and essentially get that IP address to stop working and off the web.

The first Trojans on the OS-X were detected in 2007, however almost none were infected by these. However, in early 2009 there were discovered Trojans in pirate copied software packages of iWork and Photoshop CS4. According to internet security company Intego as many as 20.000 computers were infected by this.

Reports out there now indicate that a botnet consisting of Mac computers infected by these Trojans has been activated and begun to attack other systems outside the botnet. An Australian blogger discovered this by seeing his computer ran at full force without any activity from his side was needed. By closer examination he found a small program that kept on attacking a web server.

A Trojan is not the same as a virus and you can not have it installed on your machine unless you perform an action to allow it to do so either. So far there is no reason to panic for the Mac users around the world as most Trojans are spread through pirate copied software, and if you stay away from these, you should be safer, however if the botnet increases in strength, it can reach your computer without you knowing it.

Symantec experts is of the opinion that a modified version of this Trojan is likely to come in near future and will become a higher risk to Mac users.

The Conficker based botnet is at the moment larger than 10 million windows based computers, and you should therefore be very restrictive running Windows on your Mac to avoid virus and Trojans.

He has a background as civil engineer and geoscientist. He has worked mainly within the oil and gas industry from the mid 1980s. He has written a few fictional novels as well as being the author of some professional litterature within oil and gas sector, he is now an editor of some web sites.

Rate this Article:

5 / 5 stars - 1 vote(s)

Re-Publish

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/internet-articles/the-first-mac-trojan-has-been-detected-and-makes-harm-on-macs-911905.html

Article Tags: mac, mac, virus, trojan, botnet, zombie, zombies, hacker, conficker, os x, mac os, russia, ukraine, rbn, russian business network, cyber crime, download, upload, windows, malicious, software, pirate copied, pirate software, illegal, cyber crime, criminals

Related Videos
Related Articles
Ask / Related Q&A

Play

How to Eject and Recover a Stuck CD or DVD on a Mac

Play

How to Use Your External Monitor as Main Display on a Mac

Play

Comparison Between Mac book Unibody and Black Mac book

Play

Beware of the Golden Cash Botnet - FrugalTech

Play

How to Detect Viruses and Spywares

Latest Internet Articles
More from Stig Kristoffersen

How To Make Money by Submitting Articles to Article Directories

By: jamiehanson | 05/01/2010
Learn about how to use article marketing method for making money through the internet.

Web Hosting Review - Think about Your Own Website before Selecting the Best Web Hosting Provider

By: jamiehanson | 05/01/2010
Different to all web hosting plans offered on the web, it is highly important to determine the sort of website that is going to be hosted by a company. Certainly, finding the right web hosting provider is more than looking for the best plans and prices of the market.

What Can We Learn From MySpace?

By: Sparxoo | 05/01/2010
In late 2003, several employees from the internet marketing group, eUniverse (now Intermix Media) launched a small side project. It took the team of developers 10 days to build the social network, MySpace. After its launch, eUniverse leveraged its over 20 million users to accelerate the growth of MySpace’s user-base. Shortly...

Celebrate colors with Free SMS service

By: Pooja Singh | 05/01/2010
Holi is a festival of colors and it helps to bring relations closer. So send love and wishes to your friends and family this Holi with Free SMS service.

7 Best Habits to Become a Successful Freelancer

By: Alina | 05/01/2010
To become a successful freelancer, it is important to develop some good habits to stay organized and disciplined. Essential work habits are required to build a strong and long freelancing career successfully. Here are some must have habits for freelancers following which can help them in taking their freelancing career to another level of success.

Here Are Easy Ways To Make Money Utilizing The Internet

By: C Mark Babcock | 05/01/2010
You can work from home and earn by completing paid surveys or mystery shop for as much time as you wish, but best of all these really are easy ways to make money utilizing the internet.

Making $250 With Surveys Online

By: Tom Tessin | 05/01/2010
You've seen the commercials, and I'm sure you've seen it on the Internet. You can get paid $250 a hour to fill out a simple survey. Well, it sounds too good to be true, and let me tell you that it's not possible to make $250 per hour, but I...

How Average People Are Achieving MLM Home Business Opportunity Success

By: Louis Martel | 05/01/2010
However by taking advantage of the available opportunities today the MLM home business industry provides great opportunity for success for the average person willing to work at it.

VIRUS MAKES CALL BY ITSELF ON CELLPHONES - A NEW WAVE OF ATTACKS TO COME

By: Stig Kristoffersen | 20/11/2009 | Cell Phones
An increase in virus attacks has been seen globally in October 2009, and it is only the beginning. I warned about virus on the smart phones to become a growing problem as early as in May 2009. The attacks so far have been less malicious than just to prove that the cellphones are vulnerable to attacks through various ways. The fact that the cellphones are less protected than the PC's makes us believe what we see now is only a beginning. You should begin to check your phone bill more closely now

NEW VIRUS ON CELLPHONES MAKES YOUR CELLPHONE MAKE CALLS WITHOUT YOU KNOWING IT

DATABASES WILL BE THE DOWNFALL OF OUR CULTURE - THE RISE OF THE AMATEUR CULTURE

By: Stig Kristoffersen | 17/11/2009 | News & Society
MyTwittFace Culture has come about as Web 2.0 has made these platforms available to everybody. Social networking sites are popping up everywhere as also Blogs are. Several experts within various areas have become skeptical to the rise of this new culture blossoming up. Is there such a thing as unbiased – objective information and has it ever occurred? Will Web 2.0 introduce more uncertainty to the facts presented as it makes way for anonymous information providers to present their “facts”

GOOGLE AIM FOR FASTER INTERNET WITH NEW PROTOCOL CALLED SPDY - REPLACING HTTP?

By: Stig Kristoffersen | 14/11/2009 | Internet
Google development team has launched the news about a new communication protocol called SPDY - short for SPEEDY. They claim this will speed up the internet twice of the exisiting level with the traditional HTTP protocol. Google does not say SPDY will replace HTTP, but rather supplement it, and that SPDY is a layered application based on the HTTP protocol, only disregards some aspects of this pioner protocol HTTP.

WATER FOUND ON THE MOON - HUMAN FLIGHT TO MARS NEXT?

By: Stig Kristoffersen | 14/11/2009 | News & Society
NASA claim they have found ice on the moon with their latest satellite LCROSS launched in June 2009. The impact its rocket Centaur and itself, have given the space scientists proof of ice in the impact crater of Centaur. This could be a milestone for space researchers as it would pave the path for human space travels to Mars within a decade. Press Conference by NASA announced this was only the first in a series of exiting news from this mission, and promised more news soon.

SNOW LEOPARD EATS YOUR DATA - APPLE OS 10.6 HAS SECURITY ISSUES

By: Stig Kristoffersen | 10/11/2009 | Computers
Apple OS X has a reputation of being stable and secure. However lately several reports begins to put holes to this myth. Security experts and computer experts worldwide reports about security holes and malfunctions in Apple OS Snow Leopard, the latest OS X version from Appple. Arguments from these experts are that Apple is not doing enough to patch and fix these errors. How does this affect you?

AVOID TO GET THE FIRST VIRUS ON YOUR IPHONE

By: Stig Kristoffersen | 09/11/2009 | Cell Phones
The iPHone has been exposed to the first virus or worm. The worm was detected by F-Secure and is relatively harmless. However you can protect yourself against this worm by changing the root password on your iPhone. The root password was set as part of your factory settings, and was set to "alpine". In this article we will show you how you can change this password and avoid infection on your iphone - at least from this virus.

FIRST VIRUS IN IPHONE

By: Stig Kristoffersen | 09/11/2009 | Cell Phones
The iPhone is attacked by a worm that changes your wall paper and puts a message on your phone. It also modifies the SHH protocol on your iphone. So far, it is relatively harmless virus, however security experts say it is just a matter of time before more serious and dangerous viruses will attack these phones.