A Monday article on eWeek.com detailed how a new Trojan horse has emerged targeting software pirates. The malware, poetically referred to as “OSX.Trojan.iServices.B” is included with copies of Adobe Photoshop Creative Suite 4. People who download the program from BitTorrent, p2p or other file sharing services would receive a clean copy of the install file. 

However, the cracking program, which is packaged with the download, contains the Trojan, which is designed to run and affect only on Macs. The malware is similar to another “iServices” Trojan discovered last week, according to Intego, a company which specializes in Macintosh security issues.

The Trojan, when run through the cracking program, extracts an executable to install a “backdoor” on the Mac user’s hard drive. After installing the file, the crack program asks the user for their administrative password, and proceeds to save the password to another directory. The backdoor is located in a folder that is not wiped when the computer is restarted, and the program is set to run indefinitely on the computer. Photoshop CS4 will then be allowed to run, via the crack program, leading some users to believe that nothing has happened.

The intent of the program is to allow remote access to a user’s computer by an outside agent. After install, Mac users may go about their normal business, with little knowledge of the secret communications being taken by the file installed in their “var/tmp/” directory. 

The program communicates a 209-byte packet to two distinct IP addresses, ostensibly communicating to a net server that the computer is “infected.”  By passing the information along to a potentially malicious outside agent, iServices B opens the gateway for operations to be performed on a Mac user’s computer by remote access.

This is not the first, nor will it be the last example of malware designed for Macintosh. If any important meaning can be emphasized by this latest news release, it is that no computer or network is impenetrable. Mac users are often led to purchase their computers based on the “user-friendly” interface and smooth operations. 

Many believe their computer is somehow rendered invulnerable by virtue of its very design, but no operating system is immune from attack by malicious software. There is also a persistent and misleading rumor circulating which maintains that there “are no viruses for Mac.”  This news release proves the fallacy to be completely without foundation, and indicates that even Mac users (and software pirates) must beware software which seems too good to be true.

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A shaky, 73-year-old jewelry maker rattled as she talked about gemstones and the gauges of silver. All of a sudden she whipped out a blow torch, sparked a flame and soldered some metal.

Vivian Tracy kept the University of Wyoming campus clean in the early 1990s, as a custodian and then as a custodial supervisor.

She now runs the jewelry and rock shop, Green Gold, alone, which faces the train tracks on First Street, as it has for 25 years. Vivian’s late husband, Bob, started the shop. Bob had a passion for jade – the stone also known as green gold. She followed his passion with him and it became hers.

Vivian’s ringed fingers handled the tools of her trade to the sound of Sean Hannity’s radio voice. Her constant neck ornament, a crucifix, was tucked into her sweatshirt that afternoon. It was her fourth go at trying to melt small snips of metal into the sides of a silver ring to strengthen it. It was a matter of melting the solder without burning out the piece connecting the ring. When she would finally get it, the ring was to hold the polished, oval stone for a bolo tie.