| Computer viruses have been a sad reality for many | | | | OSX.Macarena. This wasn't a virus that caused any |
| years. The first PC virus was more of an accident | | | | harm, but it did infect files on the computer. |
| than anything else, but it was a gateway to much | | | | Power-PC's had nothing to fear because it could not |
| larger endeavors all done in the name of destabilizing | | | | affect them. Clearly the majority of Mac viruses were |
| computers. The Macintosh computer was one of the | | | | intended for fun rather than harm. |
| first machines to feature a graphical interface and | | | | To further demonstrate the futility of most Macintosh |
| supported by proprietary software. Though these | | | | viruses, another harmless one was conceived of and |
| viruses are not as prevalent nor as damaging as PC | | | | designed in 1998. It was called the Hong Kong virus |
| viruses, as more people switch to Mac, its operating | | | | and all it would do was simply overwrite files with |
| system has become a target for viruses as well. | | | | random characters on Power-PC systems. If you |
| A Mac Virus? | | | | found yourself infected with this virus, all you needed |
| Let's take a look at a few of the different Mac viruses | | | | to do was disable autorun in QuickTime. This was not |
| out there. | | | | largely inconvenient as you could manually select the |
| In 1994, the INIT-29-B virus was born. This was a virus | | | | CD-ROM device. |
| that could alter applications and system files. It would | | | | Within pirated copies of iWork 09 and Adobe |
| cause programs to crash at random though there was | | | | Photoshop for Mac OS, a virus was embedded, |
| no specific control over the programs it would affect. | | | | capable of stealing the owner's password and |
| Though it was limited, it could certainly be very | | | | launching denial of service attacks. This virus was |
| annoying. | | | | called the OSX.Iservice or iBotNet. |
| July of 1995 saw a virus that would affect HyperCard | | | | Initially, Mac viruses were fairly harmless, but later |
| stacks. While it would not affect your system files, it | | | | versions have become a bit more damaging. |
| would spread to other HyperCard stacks on the | | | | Eventually, as the threat grows, we may long for the |
| system making them virtually unusable. This could | | | | old days when we saw the harmless 'pickle.' Viruses |
| cause your machine to freeze up and mention "pickle." | | | | are not exclusive to PC's anymore. Us Mac owners |
| No real damage, but a bit irritating. | | | | will have to take precautions to protect against the |
| November 2006 saw the introduction of | | | | growing virus threat. |