can a malicious software running in Parallels Desktop gain access to OS X?

MacMan988 said:

Hi, I'm a bit worried about having to install Windows in parallels regarding the computer security. Is parallels runs in a sandbox environment? If theres a software running in windows on parallels and stealing data, will it be able to access my data store in the OS X ? (Documents directory, Music etc?)

Click to expand...

Unless you go through very specific, deliberate steps to enable it, no Windows application can write on your OS X partition, and no Windows app, including malware, can run in OS X.

Maybe.

There are exploits to get out of the hypervisor for some versions of other hypervisors.


Though the likelihood is very very low.

https://ng.techweb.com/authds/gatew...virtualization-vulnerability-allows/240001996

Given the track record Parallels has had with regards to performance vs stability (it's faster than vmware but has had previous data corruption bugs) i wouldn't rule it out.

Again though, very very unlikely, and i doubt someone who's capable of writing such an exploit would bother to target parallels on mac, the number of targets is simply too low.

More info:
http://blogs.gartner.com/neil_macdonald/2011/01/26/yes-hypervisors-are-vulnerable/

Again.... not likely.

Any malware may have access to your personal files:
- By default (It may depend on the version), Parallel will share your Mac home folder with Windows.
- This is with read/write access.

This "feature" can be deactivated in the configuration of your VM ("Options" / "Sharing").

EDIT: For security reasons, you can disable everything in the "sharing" settings (look also in the "security" settings).

bist said:

Any malware may have access to your personal files:
- By default (It may depend on the version), Parallel will share your Mac home folder with Windows.
- This is with read/write access.

This "feature" can be deactivated in the configuration of your VM ("Options" / "Sharing").

Click to expand...

That's good to know.

Likelihood of cross infection is pretty low (Mac won't generally run PC malware) though.