Loading ...“I have a Mac, so I am safe from malware.” This is a common assumption of Mac owners, worldwide.
However, to their dismay, their assumption is nothing but a misconception. It is very much true that, when it comes to malware, Mac operating system is far more secure than Windows series of operating systems. Yet to assume that it is completely malware-proof is nothing but an aberration.
In a recent interview with “Macworld”, Catalin Cosoi, head of Online Threats Lab at security firm Bitdefender, warned Mac users worldwide that there are still various types of threats that a Mac OS can be prone to and that the situation is going to worsen further.
In fact, with every passing day, more and more threats related to Mac are being reported by security firms. Very recently security company Intego identified a new Trojan horse that disguises as a Flash Player installation package for OS X Lion. F-Secure also warned against a Trojan named Dropper:OSX/Revir.A, which appears as a Chinese-language PDF document.
Cosoi said, “Even though you believe you don’t have malware or a virus on your computer, once you install a solution you might have a surprise.”
Cosoi noted that present day malware won’t reveal any symptoms for their existence. ”Users think that they will know that their computer is affected. Modern malware isn’t like that anymore. Modern malware tries to remain undetected as much as possible in order to make use of some of your resources for sending spam to other people, for monitoring your activity at a computer and extract information.”
The biggest threat to Mac OS, as identified by Cosoi, is fake antivirus. A fake antivirus is indeed a scareware, meant to scare the hell out of you by showing you a list of numerous threats, and compel you to buy a software that doesn’t exist at first place. In other words, it is meant to rob you of your hard-earned money. Cosoi further added that backdoor malware is another equally potent threat, which can discreetly intrude a Mac computer, and open the channels for hackers to steal the private information of Mac users.
To cap it all, it is in the best interest of Mac users to get out of the false impression that if they have a Mac computer, they are safe from any threat whatsoever. What they need is to install a licensed security software of a reputed online security company in their Mac computer, schedule regular antivirus scans of their PC, and keep its virus definitions updated. They should not forget that prevention is better than cure.
