Technovia

If you're posting about viruses on the Mac, think before you post

Mac OS X viruses and trojans | creativebits:

"I'm sick of anti-virus companies reporting on supposed OS X viruses and trojans.

The latest anti-virus company expressing its greed was Intego, who reported about an OS X trojan that is supposedly out in the wild redirecting unsuspecting browsers to fake sites stealing their credit card info. Woo-hoo!"

So what Ivan is saying is that Intego shouldn't have reported this, because it makes anti-virus software? Or that, in reporting it - clearly and accurately, with the details of how it works there for all to read - it is being "greedy"?

I'm sorry, but calling Intego "greedy" because they're alerted the Mac community to a potential threat is just silly. Intego have done nothing wrong here. They haven't put out a press release; they haven't made any over-the-top claims; they haven't tried to portray the malware as a huge threat. They've simply described it, and let people make up their own minds.

.Mac sync: Still broken. Does Apple care?

It's now 12 days since Apple began its "scheduled maintenance" on .Mac's synchronisation services, and as yet there's no sign of when - or indeed, if - it's going to get back to normal. It remains broken, especially if you're using Leopard.

This is simply unacceptable service, particularly given that there are free services out there which can do much the same job - some of them cross-platform too.

The reason that we are prepared to pay a premium price for services like this is because we expect Apple to provide a premium service in return. If Apple cannot do that, then it should expect to lose business.

Technorati Tags:
Apple, Mac, Mac OS X, .mac

Anyone getting this bug in Leopard Mail?

For some reason, Apple Mail is showing two versions of the "On My Mac" folders. It's not two seperate versions - only one set really exists - but they're listed twice. Anyone have any ideas?

UPDATE: Thanks to both Paolo and Michael in the comments below for giving a fix - all you need to do is grab the duplicate "On my Mac" folders in the sidebar and move them somewhere else (say above junk mail). They then disappear.

Mac OS X malware on the loose?

Intego has a report of what looks like a classic piece of malware appearing on the Mac. What it is calling OSX.RSPlug.A Trojan Horse is a trojan which purports to be a codec required to view adult videos, which in fact installs something much more nasty:

"This Trojan horse, a form of DNSChanger, uses a sophisticated method, via the scutil command, to change the Mac’s DNS server (the server that is used to look up the correspondences between domain names and IP addresses for web sites and other Internet services). When this new, malicious, DNS server is active, it hijacks some web requests, leading users to phishing web sites (for sites such as Ebay, PayPal and some banks), or simply to web pages displaying ads for other pornographic web sites. In the first case, users may think they are on legitimate sites and enter a user name and password, a credit card, or an account number, which will then be hijacked. In the latter case, it seems that this is being done solely to generate ad revenue."

This is a classic trojan, and is very typical of the kinds of malware seen on Windows. As I've said on several occasions, the impression that most Mac users have of malware - that it relies on flaws in the operating system for infection - is false. The vast majority of modern Windows malware works by fooling the user into allowing an install, usually by getting them to run an application either from a web site or received through email.

There's no indication from Intego of how far this has spread, but from the description it certainly sounds like it's in the wild, and if you're in the habit of visit the more dubious parts of the internet - or, for that matter, downloading pirate copies of bran new operating systems - it would be wise to be very careful about anything which asks you to install software.

I'm sure there will be much more about this over the next couple of days.

UPDATE: Rob Griffiths at Macworld has written up instructions on how to manually remove the malware if you have it.

Technorati Tags:
Apple, Mac, Mac OS X, Security, Malware

links for 2007-10-31

• So Long Apple. The Party's Over
  Java developers very, very pissed off with the lack of decent Java support in Leopard.
  (tags: java apple macosx leopard)
• Google Announces the OpenSocial API
  Mark me as "unconvinced".
  (tags: google Social socialnetworking web2.0 opensocial api)
• Cory Doctorow - A Reverse Surveillance Society
  (tags: corydoctorow net culture)

And the award for snappiest headline of the day goes to...

George Ou, for "Microsoft Unified Communications shuns G.722 wideband interoperability".

Sadly. I know what this means. I have obviously spent too long in the hardcore world of telecommunications.

File under: Things to try with Linux tonight

How To: Make Your Linux Desktop Look Like a Mac.

And not just any old Mac: a Leopard Mac.

Could the grown-up at Gizmodo slap Charlie White, please?

Oh dear. Think Pink: Like Breasts? Get a 250GB Pink WD Passport Drive to Celebrate.

In addition to being one of our favorite holidays, today is the last day of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Besides squeezing a ripe pair of tittles, what better way to celebrate than picking up a pink Western Digital Passport drive with 250GB of storage on board?

(My emphasis)

Maybe I'm just a humourless curmudgeon, but isn't that just a bit crass, offensive, and generally the kind of thing a complete wanker would write?

Why is Google making OpenSocial? The answer, as always, is advertising

Lots and lots and lots of talk today about OpenSocial, Google's social networking platform which it's finally set to announce. Unlike other social networking platforms, OpenSocial isn't a walled garden - instead, it's a set of APIs which link together profile, friends and activities, allowing you to tap into
information which Google holds for you.

The list of hosts and developers is interesting, including basically everyone except Microsoft, MySpace and Facebook - the companies which stand to gain most from a walled-garden approach to social networking. Plaxo, LinkedIn and others will be hosts. Developers include the hyper-popular iLike.

What Google is doing effectively redefines the idea of a social network, moving it from the closed, proprietary world of the likes of MySpace into the heart of the web itself. OpenSocial will allow anyone to build bespoke social networks based on the cornerstones of friends, profile and activities, without having to find themselves locked into a single site. It will allow a huge amount of fluidity in social networks, so that groups can splinter away from existing sites and move - wholesale, if they want - onto others. Or even, if they feel like it, build their own.


Key question: Why is Google doing this? Is it just to hurt Facebook, after the start up spurned its offer of investment? The answer is, of course, no. Instead it's all about making Google's search and advertising capabilities even more powerful, by putting together vast data maps of interests and relationships. Knowing what activities you like and who your friends are is incredibly powerful data for targeted marketing, and could potentially make advertising MUCH more interesting on a personal basis. Google will, undoubtedly, let you opt out: but the ultimate aim is to make advertising that's so tightly targeted to you that it anticipates your needs almost before you know you have them.

When you have advertising that's as personal as that, it almost ceases to be advertising. Instead, it's in the realms of pre-emptive search, giving you information you actually want, at the time you most want it. It'll be really interesting to see how far Google can push this as time goes on.

UPDATE Dave thinks that it's all about undermining Facebook. I don't think that's the case at all: Google has so much money that there's a dozen far more effective ways it could undermine Facebook (not least by simply buying it).

A great headline matters

Nick Bradbury is totally right: the best way to grab reader's attention (and hopefully hook them) is through a good headline. This is something that professional writers have known since the dawn of time - think of those cave paintings as just great headlines about the size of the hunter's mammoth :)