OSX Security

[peterapple]

Just a little security question.

I think its fairly safe to say that the mac is no longer free from malware and viruses, but I think I may have one.

The only computer in our house at the moment is my 13.3 inch Macbook Pro, which I leave on all day. I don't use the internet very often, but we are exceeding our bandwidth limit, every month with out fail.

I am wondering if maybe I have some "worm" type malware, on my computer

If so what can I do about this? can someone help me, or point me in the right direction.

Thanks

 

[42streetsdown]

You suspect malware is hogging your bandwidth? What is your data cap? what kind of the things do you do online daily?

 

[peterapple]

Fairly standard stuff, We have a 20 gig plan.

Today was a regular day my total list of activitys:
- Facebook - 45 minutes.
- Youtube - 20 minutes.
- This - 20 minutes.
- Home Work / Study - 2 hours. (Lots of Wikipedia articles, standard web
pages)
- Tumblr - 30 minutes
- Downloading pictures - 18 MB

Nothing excessive, I find it odd, everyone else in my family spends about an hour doing fairly similar stuff (I'm the techie )

I am fairly certain no one is stealing our WiFi, as our neighbors are all elderly.

Any help or suggestions would be great.

 

[maflynn]

I recommend picking up littlesnitch You'll be able to monitor and block any outgoing transmissions. You'll see which apps phone home and determine if there's anything a miss.

Its a great and handy app.

 

[aristobrat]

If you have a Mac virus or worm that's using a ton of bandwidth, unfortunately you're the first to get it, so there's no AV program that can help.

As suggested, try the Little Snitch utility. It should make you aware of literally every program on your Mac that attempts to use the network.

 

[simsaladimbamba]

I think its fairly safe to say that the mac is no longer free from malware and viruses, but I think I may have one.

There are still zero viruses for Mac OS X in public circulation.
Other kinds of malware, like trojans, need to be installed by the user of the Mac manually.

Mac Virus/Malware Info by GGJstudios
There are currently no viruses for Mac OS X in public circulation, only a handful of trojans and other malware, which have to be installed manually via entering the administrator password.
The only anti-virus you need to protect your Mac is education and common sense.​

 

[arjen92]

I am fairly certain no one is stealing our WiFi, as our neighbors are all elderly.

You never know with those elderly people

Maybe it's because your uploading too much? we we're always going over the limit, not because of downloading, but because of uploading.

And maybe youtube is the killer. But yes with Little Snitch you'll find out.

 

[42streetsdown]

I am fairly certain no one is stealing our WiFi, as our neighbors are all elderly.

Is your WiFi secure? try setting up MAC filtering on your router to make sure you're the only one using it.

 

[r0k]

Do you use off site backup like Crashplan? Uploading your entire hard drive could blow through any caps pretty quickly.

Do you have mobile me? If you do, disable back to my mac just to make sure somebody isn't stealing your bandwidth by knowing your mobile me password and running stuff on your machine remotely. Also MobileMe syncs some files across machines and might push a lot of data up to the net if you have all its sync features turned on. Check those as well.

I also recommend little snitch but I must admit it can be a pain. It pops up absolutely every time a new program asks for net access and can get old pretty quick. Of course the alternative is not knowing what's going on so I put up with it.

Before bothering with mac filtering, perhaps you can set up a new (hidden) ssid and wpa password for your wifi. Anybody that was stealing it will no longer be able to get at it. Of course this means changing settings on all your machines but at least you will know nobody can get in the new ssid right away.