Surprise, Mac users! Pirated iWork download contains a trojan

by Lee Mathews on January 22, 2009 at 06:45 PM

Macs are getting more popular, so it stands to reason that we're going to start seeing more of this. As reported by our pals at TUAW, there's a Mac trojan floating around inside a pirated iWork '09 release that has appeared on various torrent sites.

While it may not be the specific torrent in the screenshot, Mac users may want to stay away from any iWork downloads until there's a bit more information available. Intego, who develop security applications for Mac, report that more than 20,000 people have already downloaded the infected torrents.

The trojan installs as soon as a user begins installing iWork, and then sends a notification to a remote server to announce a new host. It also installs into /System/Library/StartupItems/iWorkServices with full permissions to read, write, and execute.

Yes Windows users, I can hear you snickering.

Nevertheless, this should serve as another reminder to all of us: be careful what you download, especially if it's from an unknown or untrusted source.

Tags: mac, osx, trojan, virus