It happened last year, and it happened again this year. The tech sector of the internet is seeing a fair share of headlines to the tune of “Safari hacked in 10 Seconds!” At the Pwn2Own conference this year, Charlie Miller, who hacked Safari last year to much the same media explosion, used Safari to gain control of a MacBook in under ten seconds. Sounds like we should be worried, right?
How easy is it to hack into a MacBook in under ten seconds? Incredibly easy if, like Charlie, you had months to find the hole, prepare the exploit well in advance, and simply run it when the time came. Oh, also, you’ll need a person willing to click on a specific link at your direction (in this case, the judges) and you’ll have full control of their computer. Yes, Miller had the whole thing planned well in advance, and he set up a link, which he then directed the judges to click and (shock and awe) he then had control of their computers.
For a hacker, that seems extremely unsatisfying. I was under the impression that hacking was more on the fly…or at least didn’t require the person being hacked to know what was going on. The fact is that the Mac OS still has no viruses for it out in the wild. There is very little threat of this type of exploit being able to take over your computer. Add to that the fact that the exploit has been told to no-one but Apple until a patch is released, and there is no reason to start freaking out about the Mac’s inherent security flaws.
As long as you are smart about what you download, and don’t type your password into applications you didn’t explicitly run, you will be fine. “Mac hacked in record time” just makes for a great headline.
Via [AppleInsider]
You are kidding, right? This is exactly how most exploits happen these days. Some people have even figured out how to inject attacks into Google Ads, so it isn't like this only happens on obscure sites.
he's saying that everyone has actually blown the story out of proportion and the claim that it took the hacker 10 seconds is false, not that it could never happen again.
Yeah, cause it's not like that's how Hacking works… looking for a hole in an OS to exploit, preparing a piece of code that will exploit that hole to it's fullest, putting a link out there for people to click on, and when they do the attack is launched… pffhh, what kind of hacker would ever do that? who ever plans their attacks, take time to find the best way to take control, write the best code to do so, then set up a way to insert the code into the victim's system in the most efficient way? Because that's what Miller did. he planned out his attack, then placed the code in an "online" (probably a self contained network) internet link – which in the real world could be disguised as a Google ad (mpbk is correct)
The idea of Hacks occurring on the fly originates mostly from Hollywood. The closest you could get to "hacking-on-the-fly" is if you were in a hacking war with someone, sending viruses back and forth and deploying your own manual counter measures – or at the most, attempting to manually exploit a hole in their security. the problem with this style is that you can only attack one system at a time. If you lay "traps" however, you can attack a far greater number of people. and with the advent of automated security software, comprehensive firewalls (both Hardware and software), it is very difficult to establish a live contention with a computer – everything is done in packets, and every packet is scanned for known malicious code designed to exploit security holes in software installed on the computer.
Oh, and miller found the hole, whose to say someone else can't/won't find it or another one like it? Apple still hasn't patched this exploit as far as I'm aware, and none of their OSes use any form of a comprehensive ASLR (Address Space Layout Randomization – places files randomly on the physical memory, while using software to keep track of where the files are, making them more difficult to gain control of). Mac security is laughable, even Vista has better security than the most comprehensive Mac security.
And don't pull the "we don't need it…" card. the only reason why there are no viruses for Macs is not because of superior security, it's because of:
a: the current U.S. anti-terrorism laws view writing and uploading any malicious code as an act of terrorism, and most people would rather not be tried as a terrorist when Macs make up only 5% of the market share, no fortune 500 company uses Macs, and the first person to write a Mac virus will almost certainly be caught (they're the only ones doing it, it's not that difficult to run an IP trace, and the records – sign in logs, surveillance footage, etc. – can always be checked if it was uploaded from a public terminal)
b: there are no bragging rights to cracking a Mac, they're that easy.