Boonana Trojan? Now is that something new, or have you heard of it before? Mac users beware! Especially if you are a lot into social networking sites, secure Mac has found out the new Trojan horse Trojan.osx.boonana.a, is out to cause problems to Mac OS X, in addition to the new version Snow Leopard [OS X 10.6].
Taking on the identity of a video, it is fast moving through social networking sites Facebook included. The Trojan comes in to form of a link into your message bearing the title ‘Is that you in the video?’ as the user taps this link, the boonana Trojan gets into a Java applet first, which downloads other files to the computer, where even an installer is added.
The installer then instantly launches and proceeds to set the system files to overlook the passwords, thereby giving room for external access to most of the files on the system. Although it is not seen, it is present behind at the startup, and most of the time stays unnoticed till it is too late. It is notorious enough to entrap users accounts so that it can spread its wings through spam messages.
Trojan is known to spread through e-mails to in addition to social media sites. Remember it’s not only the Mac users who need to watch out when downloading links to their PCs. The Java counterpart of the Trojan is cross platform and can cause trouble to Microsoft Windows users too. It is Secure Mac again, which has noted that Trojan horses attacking Windows although the how aspect is not yet solved.
It is also important to know that Trojan tries to conceal its internet actions and communications with the help of obfuscated codes along multiple files and will further try to connect to other command servers even if the primary ones are not reachable. So check carefully before you tap the links.
Server Mac has come out with a removal tool [download link] as a remedial measure to get rid of this virus. Users can opt to turn off the Java in their browsers to avoid Trojan horse. It is made possible by Safari by clicking the security tab under Safari Preferences and ensuring that the ‘Enabled Java’ checkbox is unchecked!
The Trojan horse runs in the background and seems to reveal system’s valuable information to servers on the internet, which can be considered a violation of any personal information. The Trojan will also try to expand itself by sending spam e-mail messages from the user to other mails. It can therefore be quite dangerous to enter your password, unless you open a particular installer file and know for sure the details of the installer.
You can look forward to antivirus and malware software companies to come out with solutions to this problem, but at the same time ensure that your friend’s videos are genuine too. In case you want to enter into a video from Facebook, be very careful, not to furnish your password. In fact it is best to skip that installer and erase it our from your system.
Unless you supply your password, the installer cannot function and is useless. Like the saying prevention is better than cure, it is easier to remove the file than to struggle later; because once Trojan is installed you will have a tough time removing its components. You can always check through Secure Mac Trojan Removal Tool, to be on the safer side.
You could also consult Secure Mac Boonana Security bulletin. The Security Company Intego too has launched a security bulletin, claiming to have been inspecting this threat for quite some time now. To them, the threat by Trojan may be comparatively low due to its faulty service in OS X, yet it has the power to pose serious threat, which people should be aware of so that they can avoid it!