Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

[David Minton <david AT designhammer.com>]

Just read about the first reports of a AppleScript based virus (actually
Trojan). The report is from Macintoch.com, which I believe to be a fairly
reliable source.

http://www.macintouch.com/simpsonsvirus.html

Follows is the summary:

> "Readers are reporting a Simpsons AppleScript virus that, when launched, 
> opens
> Outlook Express in the background and sends a copy of the original message,
> and the script, entitled "Simpsons Episodes," to everyone in your address
> book. (We have received no reports of destructive behavior from the script,
> however, but the script is compiled as run-only, so we cannot check its
> contents.)
>     We are waiting to hear back from some of the virus centers with more
> details and additional confirmation, but the worm does appear to be similar 
> to
> many of the PC-specific Visual Basic scripts that have floated around the 
> net
> over the last few years.
> 
> We've since run the script on a closed system, and can confirm the activity
> mentioned in the two emails - in our case, the script launched Entourage and
> attempted to resend the message through a dummy account. (Before sending the
> emails, Entourage did warn us of suspicious behavior and allowed us to 
> cancel
> the send process.) Attempting to quit either Internet Explorer or Entourage
> resulted in the applications' relaunching, and the only way we could get our
> system back was to cycle the power and restart it with extensions off, since
> the script copies itself to the Startup Items folder in the System Folder."

While this may turn out to be a hoax, I think it is worth noting. Does this
mean the Mac OS is again a viable computing platform? We Mac user were
feeling very left out not getting targeting by viruses (I only recall two
new ones in the last five years).

David


-------------------------------
David Minton - Managing Partner
DesignHammer Media Group, LLC
www.designhammer.com
919.539.7934