Welcome to the malware world, Mac users

It's a trifecta, and the only thing surprising is just how fast this is evolving.

First up, Mac malware can now install without prompting you for a password:

Earlier rogue anti-virus strains, such as MacDefender, need permission to run, a hurdle MacGuard neatly sidesteps. MacGuard works on the premise that home users have administrator rights, meaning they don't need to enter the administrator password to install software in the Applications folder.

MacGuard downloads itself into this folder rather than the default download folder. This downloader connects to malicious IP addresses hidden in its own resources folder. The appearance of the malware means that advice to treat all unexpected requests for the administrator password with suspicion becomes moot.

This is exceptionally bad juju - silent "drive by" downloads have been one of the worst aspects of the Windows security environment for years, because even security savvy users are vulnerable.  Welcome to the party, Mac fanboys!

Second, Apple has finally admitted that malware is a big problem, and has released a malware cleaner:

Apple has updated its Mac operating system to protect against a malicious application that has been hoodwinked untold numbers of users by masquerading as legitimate security software that warns they have serious infections on their machines.

Apple issued Security Update 2011-003 on Tuesday to update Mac OS X to detect for MacDefender, one of several trojans that gets installed through an elaborate ruse that's become almost a rite of passage for owners of machines running Microsoft Windows. Those behind the scareware hook their victims by presenting them with web images that depict an antivirus scan taking place on their machines. The images falsely claim users have serious malware infections and urge them to download and install the antivirus package. Those who fall for the scam are then infected.

If you're running OS X run, do not walk to get the update. 

Third, it's not at all clear that this will solve the problem:

Just hours after Apple updated a security update to protect Mac users against a rash of scareware attacks, a new variant began circulating that completely bypasses the malware-blocking measure.

The trojan arrives in a file called mdinstall.pkg and installs MacGuard, a malicious application that masquerades as security software the user needs to clean a Mac of some nasty infections said to be discovered during a recent hard drive scan. As reported repeatedly during recent days, a series of clever social engineering attacks on Google, Facebook and elsewhere have been besieging Mac users and tricking a fair percentage of them into installing the rogue antivirus packages.

 The "security is better on Mac" meme is pretty well dead in the water now.  We see all of the behavior on OS X that we see on Windows - rapidly mutating and evolving malware that bypasses current security controls.

About all I have to add is that if Linux hits 7-8% of the desktop market, it will go through precisely the same thing.

And for a touch of black humor, this has to be shown:



That's OK - I'll be fine.  Oooooh kaaaay, then.