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Things I wish everyone knew about home Mac security

Dave Farquhar Macintosh, security May 18, 2012antivirus, apple, avast, computer security, cybersecurity, firewall, mac os x, Microsoft Office, os x, passwords

On Wednesday evening, I wrote about basic computer security from a Windows-centric perspective. I knew some people who needed help in a hurry, and given there was a 90% or so chance they were running Windows, I took that route.

Some of my buddies who use Macs passed it along. And much of what I said then does apply, but I’d like to clarify a few of those points.
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Dave Farquhar

David Farquhar is a computer security professional, entrepreneur, and author. He has written professionally about computers since 1991, so he was writing about retro computers when they were still new. He has been working in IT professionally since 1994 and has specialized in vulnerability management since 2013. He holds Security+ and CISSP certifications. Today he blogs five times a week, mostly about retro computers and retro gaming covering the time period from 1975 to 2000.

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The origins of Prince of Persia unearthed

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing April 23, 2012August 20, 20181980s, 6502, apple, apple ii, atari, commodore, commodore 64, USB flash drive, video game

Prince of Persia isn’t just a recent movie. It’s based on a video game series, the first of which was first released all the way back in 1989 for the venerable Apple II series of 8-bit computers. That original game, extremely simple by today’s standards, is a classic today.

The author, Jordan Mechner, had given up on looking for the 6502 assembly language source code behind the game until his dad found a box of disks buried in a closet. Among them were several hand-labeled disks claiming to contain the long-lost code. Read more

Dave Farquhar

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What’s going on with Macintosh security?

Dave Farquhar Macintosh, security, Viruses April 22, 2012antivirus, apple, computer security, mac os x, macintosh, malware, McAfee, Microsoft Security Essentials, os x, symantec

The latest figures I’ve read say there are perhaps a half-million infected Macintoshes still floating around out there, an improvement from the high of 600,000 that I was seeing a few weeks ago, but probably not what Apple had hoped after releasing its most recent fix.

I argued three weeks ago that the end of the innocence was either here or very near. I’ll argue now that it’s gone: There are now 250 known Macintosh OS X viruses in existence. In 2003 there were none. Read more

Dave Farquhar

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The web reacts to Jack Tramiel’s death

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing April 10, 2012August 1, 20171980s, 1990s, apple, CBM, commodore, IBM, jack tramiel

Numerous tributes appeared today as word of Commodore founder Jack Tramiel’s death spread. Read more

Dave Farquhar

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RIP, Jack Tramiel, founder of Commodore

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing April 9, 2012January 28, 20261980s, apple, atari, atari st, Chuck Peddle, commodore, commodore 64, dell, IBM, jack tramiel, Linus Torvalds, motorola, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Texas Instruments, TI

Commodore founder Jack Tramiel, the orchestrator of the first line of affordable personal computers, died this weekend at the age of 83.

I don’t know exactly what to think about it, and I’m probably not alone, though it didn’t take long for tributes to pour in. Read more

Dave Farquhar

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Remember Plextor? Now they’re making SSDs.

Dave Farquhar Hardware April 9, 2012April 3, 20251990s, anandtech, apple, intel, kingston, kodak, marvell, micron, ocz, plextor, samsung, Taiyo Yuden, toshiba

Those of you who’ve been around as long as I have–which is probably most of you–will remember Plextor as the maker of the very best SCSI CD-ROM drives back when there was a market for SCSI CD-ROM drives. I had one, and I haven’t used it in years, but I relied on it, especially when I was doing A/V work. And it never, ever let me down. Read more

Dave Farquhar

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Macintosh malware continues to evolve

Dave Farquhar Macintosh, security April 3, 2012April 15, 2017apple, mac os x, macintosh, malware, os x, pc world, STIG, vulnerability

Security experts have long warned that [Apple’s] delay in delivering Java patches on Mac OS could be used by malware writers to their advantage, and the new Flashback.K malware confirms that they were right. — PC World magazine

Last week I argued that a Macintosh-based botnet currently being distributed via Word document would likely change distribution methods, perhaps to a PDF document, in order to spread itself more effectively.

That, to my knowledge, hasn’t happened, but today I learned of the above example of Mac malware doing exactly that, jumping from Java vulnerability to Java vulnerability. Read more

Dave Farquhar

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Don’t call the war on hackers unwinnable

Dave Farquhar security March 31, 2012May 25, 2020antivirus, apple, Bill Gates, cissp, john c dvorak, oracle, passwords, Pearl Harbor, spam

John C Dvorak asks what war we’re waging on hackers. While war may not be the best choice of words, because it’s not exactly a conventional war, there’s no question there’s something going on, and we’re not winning it right now.

The latest salvo is that someone in China is building a botnet using Macintoshes. Read more

Dave Farquhar

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End of the innocence for Mac security

Dave Farquhar Macintosh, security March 30, 2012Adobe Acrobat, Adobe Reader, antivirus, apple, firefox, mac os x, macintosh, malicious code, malware, Malware Domains, microsoft word, office 2007, os x, pdf files, spyware, trojan horse, vector, vulnerability, yahoo

Antivirus vendor Kapersky has identified a new trojan horse targetting Macintoshes. It spreads a botnet based somewhere in China via an infected Microsoft Word document, typically sent as an e-mail attachment.

The spin is that if you don’t use Word on your Mac, you’re safe. That’s true–this week. But going forward, it’s going to take more than that. Read more

Dave Farquhar

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Umm, no, that’s not Commodore, and that’s not an Amiga

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing March 23, 20121950s, 1980s, amiga, amiga os, apple, commodore, commodore vic 20, IBM, intel, jack tramiel, kenmore, macintosh, sears, whirlpool

Some stories floating around are suggesting that Commodore is still around, and they just released a new, overpriced Amiga.

Well, there’s a company slapping “Commodore” and “Amiga” labels on PC cases that look kind of like Apple Mac Mini cases and stuffing off-the-shelf components in them, but they’re Commodore Amigas in name only. Read more

Dave Farquhar

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