Flashback botnet not shrinking, huge numbers of Macs still infected

[steve2470]

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9226429/Flashback_botnet_not_shrinking_huge_numbers_of_Macs_still_infected_?source=rss_keyword_edpicks&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+computerworld%2Fs%2Ffeed%2Fkeyword%2FEditorsPicks+%28Computerworld+Editors%27+Picks%29&google_editors_picks=true

Computerworld - Contrary to reports by several security companies, the Flashback botnet is not shrinking, the Russian antivirus firm that first reported the massive infection three weeks ago claimed today.

Dr. Web, which earlier this month was the first to report the largest-ever successful malware attack against Apple's OS X, said Friday that the pool of Flashback-infected Macs still hovers around the 650,000 mark, and that infections are continuing.

Also on Friday, Liam O Murchu, manager of operations at Symantec's security response center, confirmed that Dr. Web's numbers were correct.

Both Dr. Web's tally and its contention that infections are ongoing flew in the face of other antivirus companies' assertions. Kaspersky Lab and Symantec, which have each "sinkholed" select domains -- hijacked them before the hackers could use them to issue orders to compromised machines -- used those domains to count the Macs that try to communicate with the malware's command-and-control centers.

[alfredo]

1. Install the update, or the free detection and removal tools.

[onehandle]

2. A tiny glitch after three decades of near immunity. Yawn.

Still not worried. Sticking with Mac.

Anyway, Apple iOS is even safer. The Mountain View Ad Agency's Android app store is full of malware and spy apps. Glad I'm not there.

[BootinUp]

3. Some of the terminology in tech world cracks me up

sinkholed, lol.

The fact is, the unix type OS have always been vulnerable depending on how the machine is set up, how it is used. There is no such thing as an OS that can't be compromised. Once these machines started proliferating in the hands of consumers it was a more relevant target for the hackers.