近期發現第一個蘋果電腦病毒

根據華爾街日報報導,新型電腦病毒可能會感染蘋果作業系統(Mac OS X). 然而,病毒威力並不強,蘋果使用者不必過於擔心,病毒會透過iChat詢問使用者是否同意接收latestpics.tgz的圖片檔案,如果同意接收的話,則會透過iChat的Buddy list將病毒檔案傳給名單上的每個人.

根據蘋果電腦指出,感染新型電腦病毒的主機可能會運作不正常.另外,根據早期的蘋果使用者指出,十五年前蘋果電腦的病毒比現在更多,所以並不驚訝蘋果電腦也會感染病毒.

大型防毒軟體公司如McAfee Inc.和Symantec都將此病毒列為低度危險.

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Virus for Mac OS X System Found
By ANDREW SIMONS
February 16, 2006 7:51 p.m.

LOS ANGELES -- Users of Apple Computer Inc.'s Macintosh computers like to think their machines are better protected than their counterparts running Microsoft Corp.'s Windows operating system.

Not so fast, says Sophos PLC, a U.K. computer-security firm.

A new virus could begin making the rounds on Macintosh computers around the world. Called Leap-A, the virus spreads through the iChat software inside the Mac OS X operating system, Sophos researchers said.

The virus masks itself as a picture file called "latestpics.tgz" -- purportedly screenshot pictures of Apple's new operating system. Once opened, it's forwarded to the people on the user's iChat buddy list.

Applications in infected machines might not run correctly.

"This is the first real virus to infect the Mac OS X," said Graham Cluley, a Sophos researcher, in an interview. "It's always been presented and marketed as a much safer operating system."

Apple played down the threat.

"Leap-A is not a virus, it is malicious software that requires a user to download the application and execute the resulting file," said an Apple spokesperson.

"Apple always advises Macintosh users to only accept files from vendors and Web sites that they know and trust," said the spokesperson. "We have a guide to safely handling files received from the Internet."

McAfee Inc. rated the virus at "low-profiled" on its security Web site, citing media attention to the threat.

Symantec Corp. also issued a notice about the worm, saying it is a low-level threat.

"This first Macintosh OS X threat is an example of the continuing spread of malicious code onto other platforms," Vincent Weafer, senior director at Symantec Security Response, said in a statement.

"However, this worm will not automatically infect, but will ask users to accept the file, giving potential victims a heads-up and the opportunity to avoid infection."

Still, the virus is rare for Macintosh users, which don't see nearly as many viruses as Windows users.

"They haven't always been immune," said Mr. Cluley, who said there used to be more Macintosh viruses 15 years ago.

But these days, viruses are designed with financial motivations -- as opposed to sheer mischief. For example, viruses can be used to steal personal information, such as credit card and bank account numbers, and send them back to the virus writers.

And there are many times more unprotected Windows users than Macintosh users.

"They don't need to go to all that extra effort to write a virus for Macs," said Mr. Cluley. "There are plenty of unprotected Windows computers out there."

Two weeks ago, a new virus threat attacked Windows users.

Discovered in the middle of January, the virus was designed to delete files created with Microsoft's Word, Excel and PowerPoint software programs that are stored on a user's local hard drive.

The virus is transferred through e-mail systems and Web browsers. Once inside an office computer network, the virus can easily transfer itself through office intranets.

The virus was set to harm files on the third day of every month. Despite high anticipation of that threat, not much happened.