Apple 10 Years Behind Microsoft on Security: Kaspersky Lab Options

[nobody813]

Apple 10 Years Behind Microsoft on Security: Kaspersky Lab

A Flashback trojan that affected over 600,000 OS X machines with relative ease, earlier this month, exposed gaping holes in the OS X software architecture and got industry experts discussing how competent Apple is at dealing with the threat of malware, on its end. Eugene Kaspersky, CEO and co-founder of security company Kaspersky Lab, believes that Apple is "10 years behind Microsoft in terms of security," and the ease with which scores of OS X machines could be compromised by malware in the recent times formed the basis of his assertion.

"For many years I've been saying that from a security point of view there is no big difference between Mac and Windows. It's always been possible to develop Mac malware, but this one was a bit different. For example it was asking questions about being installed on the system and, using vulnerabilities, it was able to get to the user mode without any alarms," Kaspersky commented. Increase in malware and cybercrime against OS X machines, according to him are "just a question of time and market share. Cyber criminals have now recognised that Mac is an interesting area. Now we have more, it's not just Flashback or Flashfake. Welcome to Microsoft's world, Mac. It's full of malware."

Following this article, which was written a few weeks ago, some more news have come in regarding this

Apple Invites Kaspersky to Improve OS X Security

Weeks after security mogul Eugene Kaspersky opined that Apple is "10 years behind Microsoft on security," Kaspersky Lab revealed that it is collaborating with Apple to investigate security concerns (read: vulnerabilities) of its operating systems, and improve its security. Kaspersky Lab CTO Nikolai Grebennikov in an interview with Computing.co.uk was quoted saying "Apple recently invited us to improve its security."

Kaspersky Lab maintains that Apple's software is extremely vulnerable, going as far as to claim that Apple doesn't pay enough attention to security. "Our first investigations show Apple doesn't pay enough attention to security. For example, Oracle closed a vulnerability in Java, which was a target for a major botnet several months ago," said Grebennikov. Apple's decision to handle updates of Java runtime environment for OS X by itself, breaking away from Oracle's update cycle, particularly drew flack from Grebennikov. "Apple blocked Oracle from updating Java on Mac OS, and they perform all the udpates themselves. They only released the patch a few weeks ago – two or three months after the Oracle patch. That's far too long," he said. Kaspersky isn't too optimistic about the infinitely more popular iOS platform, either. "Our experience tells us that in the near future, perhaps in a year or so, we will see the first malware targeting iOS," it commented.

This post has been edited by nobody813: May 15 2012, 08:57 AM

[TinBane]

Interestingly only talking about malware. The as-predicted mac viruses have yet to materialise.
Apple should fix up it's timely updating of Java, for sure, but claiming that Apple is in the same position as Microsoft was at launch of XP is bordering of farcical.
Given that Java is sandboxed in safari, it's debatable how much the end user should give a shit about this 'vulnerability'.

Malware will always exist, and Kaspersky want their software on every mac and iphone.
At the end of the day, I believe that an informed end-user is much better than using software. Treat the cause, not the symptom.

[osama_bin_athlon]

they've solved this problem with the new Macbook Pro, they have no ethernet port, so problem solved.

[tantryl]

Interestingly only talking about malware. The as-predicted mac viruses have yet to materialise.

Um. What?

The Flashback trojan is the main focus of the articles? It's a virus?

You also seem to be suggesting that viruses are still rife on PCs and malware isn't pretty much the only game in town now.

[SquallStrife]

Flashback still required a user to run the infected file to gain access to the system.

I think Tinny is implying that a virus is self-replicating, in contrast to a trojan.

[Devilsmurf]

Using the defintion that virii require no user intervention, how long has it been since Windows has been affected by a virus ?

I know I mix the terminology up myself quite a lot, so it's a valid question and not a troll.

What I do see this as an opportunity for people who do find vulnerabilities to parlay that into jobs with Apple in security, the same way a lot(ok some )people did the same with systems in '90s.

[.:Cyb3rGlitch:.]

I always take these reports with a grain of salt. These people are only interested in one thing, pushing their product. They also claim Android has malware. Unless you personally ok it to install, there's no way for malware to do anything.

[fliptopia]

Interestingly only talking about malware. The as-predicted mac viruses have yet to materialise.
Apple should fix up it's timely updating of Java, for sure, but claiming that Apple is in the same position as Microsoft was at launch of XP is bordering of farcical.
Given that Java is sandboxed in safari, it's debatable how much the end user should give a shit about this 'vulnerability'.

Malware will always exist, and Kaspersky want their software on every mac and iphone.
At the end of the day, I believe that an informed end-user is much better than using software. Treat the cause, not the symptom.

Informed end users, as a majority, is never going to happen ever. It's just not possible to get enough people interested in their own security when it means they have to know about what they do. I'm not talking people down so much as pointing out that some people just aren't computer minded or are too busy with whatever they do to stay informed of the latest threats or understand what to look out for.

[TinBane]

Interestingly only talking about malware. The as-predicted mac viruses have yet to materialise.

Um. What?

The Flashback trojan is the main focus of the articles? It's a virus?

You also seem to be suggesting that viruses are still rife on PCs and malware isn't pretty much the only game in town now.

As pointed out, software that asks you to give it administration access in order to install, isn't a virus. A virus installs itself, and can transmit to further machines.
Malware is much more prevalent, however on windows there are still a lot of systems using out of date browsers with out of date default settings, that can be exploited to create a self-installing malware on your computer. Which to my mind satisfies criteria A.
Suffice to say, it's more of an issue than on Apple.

But in either case, how is Apple 10 years behind?
Windows does a lot of tricks to move libraries around in memory, which is nice, but mainly done because hacking windows memory addresses was just too easy in a way it's not been since mac was on classic OS.
Apple doesn't do that, but then they are moving a long way into sandboxing, faster than windows. Unfortunately, along with any security changes, there are issues.

If you focus only on security, you compromise on features. Forcing full sandboxing, makes it hard to link up applications.

Ultimately, the end user needs to take responsability. They need to know what they are doing when they type in the admin password.
You can't code an OS to stop a moron doing moronic things. Not while being user friendly, and not scaring away the tech savvy.

Apple are moving towards signing packages, and giving the OS options to not allow any installs apart from app store apps, and signed apps. It's entirely benign and security related (and not mandatory) but it doesn't stop the haters hating.

Even then, there's heaps of "not quite malware, but not really legit" things like mackeeper, or kaspersky, where they'll sign okay (because they'll pay apple, and it's not a virus) but the net result is a subscription costing you $$ per annum while doing not much.
Likewise, facebook app on iOS is what I would consider malware. Only problem is, if your friends install it, it effects you too.

Malware might be the new virus, but the new malware isn't made by hackers. It's made by entrepreneurs.

Informed end users, as a majority, is never going to happen ever. It's just not possible to get enough people interested in their own security when it means they have to know about what they do. I'm not talking people down so much as pointing out that some people just aren't computer minded or are too busy with whatever they do to stay informed of the latest threats or understand what to look out for.

Absolutely.

[smakme7757]

Informed end users, as a majority, is never going to happen ever. It's just not possible to get enough people interested in their own security when it means they have to know about what they do. I'm not talking people down so much as pointing out that some people just aren't computer minded or are too busy with whatever they do to stay informed of the latest threats or understand what to look out for.

Absolutely.

+1 to this as well.

The computer was desgined to get work done and to most people a computer, be it a PC or a Mac, is just a tool to help them at work. The IT department is there to hold their hand. The same goes for home users. In their case as long as the antivirus says "Your computer is protected" they believe that everything is all good. Those that run Mac just think they are safe.

There is a reason why forums are overfowing with threads like: "I have an antivirus, it's updated, how did i get a virus? I thought <insert AV software name here> was good....?"

Personally i just feel that so many people forget that it's their passion for computing that makes it easy. For everyone else a computer is a big fat PITA!

This post has been edited by smakme7757: Oct 1 2012, 07:01 PM