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My immune mac

O

oddfuzz

macrumors member
Original poster
Feb 20, 2002
31
0
missouri
I'm here at college and a few days ago i got a stange e-mail from somebody at my university that i didn't know with the subject "Worm Klez.E immunity." It was merely a doc attachment so i opened it and it simply appeared to be his paper on forestry. Thoroughly confused, i closed the email, and soon forgot about it. Untill today, when i got a warning from our IT department saying this:

"KLEZ VIRUS
In the past of couple weeks, we have had a computer virus known as the Klez virus circulating around campus. This virus can infect computers via email or by writing itself to an open network share on a computer.

Once a computer is infected it will try to disable any antivirus software running on your computer, and then it will send itself to other computers by email or by network share. The virus may also attach a random file from your computer which may include personal data. Like many computer viruses, Klez will send itself to everyone in your Address Book, but unlike most viruses, Klez will pick a random name from the address book to use as the return address, so the people receiving the email do not know who it is really from.

The email will come with a random subject, and contain at least one attachment. Sometimes the messages will also include a document from the infected computer that may contain sensitive data. There is even one form of the virus that sends a message with the subject "Worm Klez.E Immunity" which contains an attachment that claims to make your computer immune to the virus, which actually contains the virus."

I was quite ammused by this seeing that this virus didn't even make my mac sneeze:cool:. Is this pretty much standard when it comes to macs and viruses? If so, it makes me quite happy.:D
 
Many, but not all, viruses are only dangerous to PCs. Because there are so many M$ users out there it makes sense for the hackers to go after the masses. But occassionally something will come along that can hurt your mac, so don't get over confident.
 
You lucky b!!!!!!, oddfuzz :)

Well, it is no surprise, how people always alert PC users (I repeat, PC users) to watch out for many of these viruses, since people fear that PCs will get affected.

And if I may speak in the profane mood I was born to talk in:

But I have to say, there are a bunch of CSers out there who have nothing to do on their own time except F around with programs and viruses so that sme innocent person falls victim to a severe computer crash. I mean it, some people are just a bunch of MFers and I can't stand it. Why should there be viruses around the internet anyways? Do they want to give people misery? Do they get money? What is it with these guys?

Just the other day my father was attacked by a computer virus at his store. And he was even using a G3 iMac (an Apple product) for CSakes! He found out when the iMac did not start up, and some F'n message pops up, saying reboot with the extentions off. He does that and he gets the same F'n thing. My father even tries starting up from the backup CD, and he has no success. So he has to call up the company where he got his computer, and the two went through step by step processes to clear up the system.

My point is that some of the CSers in this world are making more and more deadly viruses, and they have some F'n ability to get into even Apple computers.

If I can sum all this up LIGHTLY: This virus BS has gone too far. Maybe some people have some fun in programming these codes, but these viruses are not going to get any better. There has to be enhanced virus protection with ALL the servers in the world, or else all the self-centered psychos are going to spread an overriding amount of viruses everywhere. And just a quick note, psychos are crazy, but not stupid.

I know, I am being a little graphic in my language, but I am really sick of this virus BS. Since Code Red last year, and the virus threats of 9-11 people are just turning into psychos.

At least I am happy to find out here that someone made it through a virus-threat without any problems.
__________________

Any time is a great time for iPod.
 
The primary goal of most virus writers, IMO, is not to cause harm - it's to reveal inadequacies in the software we all run in the hopes that it will be improved. Then again, many virus writers are 15 year-old kids who can't even spell "ideology," much less abide by one.

Viruses are not an inherent part of computing - there ARE systems which are virtually immune to them (at least those which spread by common methods like e-mail and WWW downloads). Although we should scorn virus writers, I feel that the companies whose products allow virii to spread so easily deserve as much blame. This includes both Microsoft and Apple, although OS X is much better than any MS OS or any previous Apple OS at thwarting the spread and effectiveness of virii.

Alex
 
oddfuzz, you're pretty lucky. i never open e-mails or other stuff unless i know what it is. by the way, i'm still using my PC until i can get a TiBook and i haven't had any problems for about 8 months. but i haven't had any strange e-mails either. i wonder how good OS X is when it comes to viruses?
 
he's not lucky -- it was designed for windows... it certaintly works on windows. it dosen't work on mac because it tries to infect various windows system files which don't exist on the mac.
 
You should really try running Outlook Express on a Wintel. I get virus alerts almost every day. :) Not that I care about my PC being infected; it's just a machine for those things that are incompatible with Mac OS.

And, in general, disable the preview pane in your mail program. Some viruses do not require the user to open the attachment (I don't know if this is possible with any mail clients for Mac, though).

--
Christian
 
I was thinking, OSX is probably the most virus free operating system, are there any viruses on it? (Apart from Word Macros)

Ensign
 
There are currently no known viruses in circulation that affect the Mac OS X. (':D')

How do I know? Simple deduction. Have you ever heard about one? Neither have I. And I'm pretty sure that a Mac-virus in the wild would cause some commotion. If not for it's destructive power, then for it's novelty.

Regarding the Klez.G virus now circling the planet; I got some the other day. Being an arrogant Mac-user I opened up the attached files and could not believe my eyes. I was looking at some poor PC-users bank-statement with a busload of details. All active accounts, the balance, a full description of where and when this poor soul had been using his/hers debitcard for the month of february and a complete rundown of all bill payments. The next attachment was an transaction recite for the amount of some $ 12000. Klez.G has probably gone through a temp-folder and used Outlook to send it out to a gazillion of strangers. Can you imagine this person screaming/begging "Thank you Bill. May I have another". What a nightmare.
 
Actually, there are plenty of viruses for macs. Just because you have not heard of them does not mean they do not exist. No platform is virus-free. You just have to go to a site for virus definitions (such as Norton.com) and search for "Macintosh" to read about them.

Many viruses are propogated by email. Most users use PC's, so it would logically be much more difficult for mac viruses to spread.
 
Umm... Tyrihans is right, I checked norton.com and it seems that there is NO viruses for MacOS X (in circulation)! But there ARE viruses for classic MacOS that seem to be very old and I bet that most of them don't work anymore.
 
totally wrong

mac os 9 was pretty good on only having a few viruses, but do you know why norton had to haul ass on getting antivirus out on osx, b/c every, and i mean every virus that was used on unix, the original hackers delight, is now able to take down any osx system. i, being a nerd, at one point wrote some small basically pathetic viruses, but they work just the same with a very timny modification. apple just jumped from about 10 viruses, to about 80,000. i don't what you guys think, you're horribly wrong if you think mac isn't open to an extreme number of viruses. go to norton and check under unix viruses, any on the list, you'll find on osx, and i can name about 1000 that will destroy you're entire system, mac or pc, running a system with a terminal. the terminal itself in osx, opened the door to anything a hacker could want in osx.
 
why would you open attachments from people you dont know? Seems a bit trusting. Go ahead and do it if you like, i wont.
 
also, we must remember that mac users are typically a breed apart from pc buyers, thusly we all seem to have built our own community in an understanding & being considerate of others. Kind of a brotherhood brought together from a life style choice. In short we are nicer to one another.

that being said, with the unix core, it will be far easier to write programs than in the world of GUI. So I can foresee a time when all of a sudden we will have the viral problem 95% of the world sees as well, especially as apple gains more stake in computer shares through educational sales and commercial (servers).

It will be those institutions that will be hurt the worst.
 
In my own experience of using a Mac since 1988, I can only remember one or two times when there were viruses out there for the Mac that actually did anything to the Mac (other then use it as a springboard to get into peecee's). Most of the Mac viruses were harmless, more of an annoyance then anything else. With the latest versions of NAV (for both OS 9 and OS X), you can scan for the virus, destroy it, and move on.

It is correct that pretty much any virus that can afflict the Mac, really doesn't. What they typically do, is send out emails that flood the email servers and bring them crashing down. Of course, you can get notices that you have a virus, even though you don't, from mailer deamons if your address is close to the one that sent out the virus (I have had this happen to me, since there is some a$$hole out there with an email address just one letter different then mine, who is contantly sending out infected emails).

The safest thing you can do, is to have NAV scan all email attachements, or to download them to your desktop, and have NAV scan anything that is placed there. That way, you get the safety of scanning, and if the item is virus free, you can open it at your leisure. I also have NAV check for updates every time I power up either my Mac or peecee. On the peecee, that is critical (with sometimes updates every day or more), on the Mac, we see NAV definition updates about once a month, or so.
 
Originally posted by AlphaTech

The safest thing you can do, is to have NAV scan all email attachements, or to download them to your desktop, and have NAV scan anything that is placed there.
Click to expand...

i feel better knowing a tech uses NAV ( i bought it because, well, i recognized the name). the only virus my mac has gotten came in thru an M$ file...figures. a quick run of NAV and all was well again. its pretty mindboggling to go to norton's sight and see the sheer number of virus' out there.:eek:
 
that reminded me of the trojan horse I recieved about 5 years ago through ICQ...I never installed that software again due to the ISP cutting my service & email account.
 
Please, every one. Say to your selves: Security in Mac OS X 10.0-4 and security in any version of Windows is not comparable. It's like comparing apples (yes) to peas.

The only tiny ittiy bitty piece of discomfort comes from having Quicktime set to Autoplay in Classic, and running it (****ty websites may take advantage of you). That's it.

Having said that. If you open up yours truly to the Net (filesharing etc.) you may be in for a rough ride.

Besides. Anybody can write an AppleScript from hell, but you need something like Outlook to make it work.
 
Re: immune?

Originally posted by kansaigaijin
how do you know it (Klez) is not sending mail of your docs right now across the net?
Click to expand...

Well, generally speaking, because it's for a different platform. You can't run a windows program natively, so you can't run a windows virus natively. Even if you launch it in VPC, any virus damage should be contained to the disk image it uses...

re: other stuff... I've gotten one virus in my entire life on a Mac... it was a looong time ago, don't even remember what it was. This was pre-norton, but Symantec Antivirus (SAM if anyone remembers it) nabbed it quickly and efficiently.

I laugh at all the virus warnings that go floating around... my own mother occasionally sends me warning messages... i've been wondering about the UNIX switch, and whether or not it would cause more virus probs...

This is kinda combining this thread with the "stupid users" techie thread... Someone, I won't say who (my mother-in-law) deleted a file at the advice of an email that said it was a virus... Turned out it was a system component, and I went through a lot of work replacing it so nothing would be lost. Went to bed, and the next morning, she had "fixed" it herself, by using GoBack software... Managed to lose quite a bit of recent data. I was not impressed.

Some people are just too stubborn to use technology.

Anyway, turning back to the subject at hand... um... viruses are bad. yeah.

:)
pnw
 
immune?

paul,
yes in this case that is right it is a windows exec type virus, but my response to Oldfuzz would be the same, not to be so smug, you should not open attachments if you don't know what they are, lots of Unix stuff runs in the background, do you really know what is going in and out of your computer? In general and not as a result of the Klez thing, but other possible threats?
 
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