Monday, March 13, 2006
UA attack highlights vulnerability of Macs
All computers must be protected from viruses
B. POOLE
Tucson Citizen
A recent cyberattack that prompted the quarantine of dozens of University of Arizona computers reminds Macintosh users that they are not immune to Internet threats.
Macs have been subject to fewer attacks than their Windows-based counterparts, partly because there are simply far fewer Macs out there to attack, but experts at UA and elsewhere agree that Macs need the same protections as Windows machines.
"There's a ... persistent fiction out there that Macs are immune to viruses and worms and so forth, so you don't need to put any virus protection on them," said physics, optical sciences and international studies Professor William H. Wing, who serves as the UA journalism department's network manager.
There is no safe computer - at home or work, Mac or Windows, said Tucson consultant Doug Baker, who helps corporate users keep bugs from sneaking through the cybercracks.
"There are weaknesses to any system. The only secure computer network is the one with no electricity running to it," Baker said.
Rich Flieger, owner of the Tucson franchise of Computer Renaissance, a nationwide retailer that repairs computers, agreed.
"Seventy percent of the problems we see are virus- and spyware-oriented," he said. "The magnitude of the problem is much more pronounced in Windows because the people doing it are looking for the largest target."
UA recovering
In an incident traced to Braila, Romania, hackers in January and early February remotely took over about 20 UA Macs to attack the University of Adelaide in Australia, Wing said.
"The computers were turned into 'zombies' and all directed to attack the same place. By attack, that means to send lots of messages to them in an attempt to overwhelm the computers on the other end," he said.
The journalism department pulled all of its Mac computers - more than six dozen - off the network and reformatted the hard drives to cleanse them of bad software, Wing said.
The incident inconvenienced instructors, who had to resort to old-school teaching methods: dry-wipe markers and overhead projectors, said journalism department head Jacqueline Sharkey.
"We didn't have to cancel classes," Sharkey said.
With computer labs closed, students couldn't work in the department, said sophomore and journalism major Christine Foglia, 19.
"We basically have to take all of our assignments home," she said.
Though hackers often try to steal information, such as bank or credit card account passwords, there is no evidence this was such an attempt, said Abraham Kuo, a systems analyst who serves on the university's five-person Security Incident Response Team.
NEXT PAGE» 1,
2,
3
