@ Iang,

As has been posted on another blog Apple appears to have taken a moderatly secure OS (BSD) and weakened the security with every single application they add.

And just to make everybody laugh look at the security issue Apple have just had with "FaceTime" ( http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/10/facetime-for-mac-opens-giant-apple-id-security-hole.ars ). The first day of use shows a security issue on a live service that should have been dealt with in the system design stage, and failing that caught by the internal security team long long long before the service went public.

But it effects not just this service from Apple, it also effects other services (iTunes) such are the issues with all Single Sign On or other Shared Authentication Services which use a common backend database for the users credentials.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/bott/microsoft-vs-apple-whos-winning-the-numbers-dont-lie/2504?tag=nl.e539

I suppose the facts speak for themselves ;-)

Hi Twan,

interesting article. Seems like Mac continues to inhabit the 5% market share point!

The facts speak for themselves, but what are they saying ;)

There's actually two factors affecting Apple's effective security, the first, as you say, is Apple's market share, the second is the fact that the global cybercrime industry has massive experience in creating Windows malware and very little at creating OS X malware. So I think malware targeting OS X (beyond simple targets of opportunity) will be more like the chances of mainstream apps targeting OS X than "it flips at 15%", you'd have to see a pretty big market opportunity to suspend current Windows development and spend several years getting up to speed on OS X. At most what we'll see is malware-VM platforms like Acrobat and Java being used for platform-neutral attacks, but otherwise I think Apple's safe for awhile yet. There may be boutique malware vendors targeting them, but the big guys have too much invested in Windows to switch easily.

A new version of the infamous Koobface worm designed to attack Mac OS X computers is spreading through Facebook and other social networking sites, security experts warn.

Security software maker Intego says this Mac OS X version of the Koobface worm is being served as part of a multi-platform attack that uses a malicious Java applet to attack users. According to Intego, the applet includes a prompt to install the malicious software:

Intego notes that if the download is allowed, “it runs a local web server and an IRC server, acts as part of a botnet, acts as a DNS changer, and can activate a number of other functions, either through files initially installed or other files downloaded subsequently. It spreads by posting messages on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, usually trying to get people to click a link to view some sort of video.”

...

Hackers took down Apple's iPhone and Safari browser, Microsoft's Internet Explore 8 (IE8) and Mozilla's Firefox within minutes at today's Pwn2Own contest, as expected.

The two-man team of Vincenzo Iozzo and Ralf-Philipp Weinmann exploited the iPhone in under five minutes, said a spokeswoman for 3Com TippingPoint, the security company that sponsored the contest. The pair also walked away with $15,000 in cash, a record prize for the challenge, which is in its fourth year.

Iozzo, an Italian college student, works for Zynamics GmbH, the company headed by noted researcher Thomas Dullien, better known as Halvar Flake, while Weinmann is a post-doctoral researcher at the Laboratory of Algorithms, Cryptology and Security at the University of Luxembourg.

Weinmann is probably best known for being part of a three-man team that in 2007 demonstrated how to crack the Wi-Fi security protocol WEP much faster than previously thought possible.

Charlie Miller, an analyst at Baltimore-based Independent Security Evaluators, brought down Safari on a MacBook Pro running Snow Leopard for a three-peat at Pwn2Own.

Miller won prizes in both 2008 and 2009 by hacking a Mac; last year, Miller cracked Safari in just 10 seconds. For his work today, Miller walked off with the notebook and $10,000 in cash.

No one else has won at Pwn2Own three times.

When his turn came, Pwn2Own newcomer Peter Vreugdenhil successfully exploited a vulnerability in IE8 running on Windows 7 with attack code called "technically impressive" by TippingPoint because it bypassed the operating system's Data Execution Prevention, or DEP, security mechanism, which is designed to stop most attacks.

Like Miller, Vreugdenhil, a freelance vulnerability researcher from the Netherlands, earned a $10,000 prize.

Another former winner, a German computer science student known only by his first name, Nils, was awarded $10,000 for hacking Firefox on Windows 7.

Of the browsers set up as targets for the contest, only Google's Chrome remained standing on the first day.

...