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Sophos Cautions about Trojan Revir Infecting Mac Computers

A fresh Trojan virus is currently pursuing computer-users having the Mac OS X of Apple Inc., applying a known disguise, which previously duped owners of Windows computers of Microsoft, Sophos the security company cautions.

The company states that the PC-Trojan recognized as OSX/Revir-B pretends to be a PDF file, while abuses vulnerabilities within Mac OS.

It further states that when the company's researchers examined the malware, they failed to run it, just what its creator possibly intended; nevertheless, strings implanted within the Trojan's code clearly suggest that the purpose behind using it is malevolent. Gmanews.tv published this on September 24, 2011.

Moreover, Revir attempted at installing a PDF implanted deep into it on the computer operator's hard drive. The file in Chinese language is regarding one contentious subject, "Do the Diaoyu Islands belong to Japan?"

Incidentally, since long, there's an ongoing row between Japan and China over the Diaoyu Islands, both claiming its ownership.

Meanwhile, if Revir is activated, it drops a backdoor, which facilitates an attacker to gain complete hold over the contaminated OS X system.

As usual, the backdoor takes commands from a distantly located computer server for theft of data alternatively taking the contaminated PC's screenshots, all of which it then transmits onto that server.

Luckily, state the security researchers, the Trojan's C&C (command-and-control) server is merely one empty Apache installation, which isn't still competent to send-or-receive messages from the backdoor.

They caution about a case wherein suppose innumerable Macs become contaminated as explained above, then there may arise a botnet of only Mac machines pushing spam/malware.

The researchers argue that as Macs obtain an increased market share within the global computer economy, and accompanied with an overall shortage of clues for Mac owners regarding the importance of anti-malware software, there've emerged several million strong, unsecured PCs for cyber-criminals to readily exploit.

And for an online crook, no botnet is better than one which's an army of zombie PCs, the owners of which believe they won't ever get contaminated, they add.

Conclusively, for computer-users wishing for safeguarding themselves from the above type of assaults must essentially install an anti-virus and keep it up-to-date.

Related article: Spike in Attacks Causes Early Release of Windows Patch

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