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Worms in the Apple? Inqtana and Leap-A Burrow intoMacs

Posted by Matthew Brodsky

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Are Apple macs just as vulnerable to worm, trojan horse and virus attacks, as notebooks running Windows? Internet security companies recently discovered the Leap-A worm that targets Apple's OS X, and a new breed of Inqtana worms that infect wirelessly through bluetooth. Should we believe the hype, or is Mac malware a serious threat?

If there'sany silver lining to the recent Leap-A worm, this realization isit:

Alas, Mac users, you do not live in the Shangri-La of operatingsystems after all. Your Macs are vulnerable to worms, viruses,and other malware, just like Windows users, so you best keep yoursecurity always up-to-date, and your eyes on the prowl for suspicious attachments.

Internet security firms found the Leap-A worm in February 2006,the first worm ever discovered that attacks Apple's OSX operating system. The experts figured out that the digitalparasite travels from victim to victim by Apple's iChat instantmessaging system.

Innocently enough, the worm forwards itself as a file titled"latestpics.tgz" that comes with a JPEG graphic icon. In thisdeceptive form, it travels to every contact on a user's buddylist. Meanwhile, back on the user's computer, the worm places thetext "oompa" in the resource forks of infected programs as amarker, so as not to reinfect the same files over and over.

As first, experts argued over whether or not Leap-A was a wormin fact, or a Trojan horse. For those of us who'd rather not knowthe difference between a worm and a Trojan horse-we'd rather justnot get either one, right?-a Trojan horse is a legitimate programthat's been corrupted and made to be destructive. Moreover, likethose Greeks who left the original Trojan horse at Paris' castlegates, someone has to plant the Trojan horse on your computer,either as a download on a Web site, e-mail, etc. Trojan horsescannot spread on their own.

Worms can. It's in their nature-or code-to spread and infect.Whoever designs these malicious versions of viruses programs theworm to disseminate and destroy. That makes Leap-A a worm forsure, because it's designed to infiltrate via the iChatapplication.

The Inqtana worms on the other hand spread wirelessly viaBluetooth. Bluetooth is a wi-fi tech used to transmit data between devices at shortdistances. Three variations of the Inqtana worm have beendetected so far, OSX/Inqtana.A, OSX/Inqtana.B andOSX/Inqtana.C.

So Mac users-it seems you had your time in the sun. Sure, backin the old days, your notebook was farless vulnerable to worms than Microsoft products. But as theTrojans learned at the hands of the Greeks, the blessing ofhistory is fleeting. Be wary, ibook, Macbook Pro, andPowerbook users.

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