With the onset of various tools in the ethical hacking industry, it has been transformed. In one recent hack, where a mysterious malware known as Silver Sparrow targeted the new M1 Macs, as many as 30,000 Apple PCs were breached.Automation has left its imprint on every industry out there, and the realm of ethical hacking is no different. Though not a cybercrime target on the same level of Microsoft’s Windows platform, Macs do come under attack. It’s also unknown just how many users have been hit. It’s unclear who else found out about the bug and why they started hacking Macs. “Shlayer continues to be one of the most active and prevalent malware families for macOS,” added Bradley. Often, Shlayer is installed on victims’ Macs via fake app installers or updaters. He said that as early as January 9, 2021, hackers running a known macOS malware called Shlayer had discovered and started using the zero-day vulnerability (one that hasn’t been patched at the time of exploitation.) The malware’s ultimate goal is to install adware on Macs, earning money for the fraudsters per faked clicks and views on advertisements. He tested it himself and confirmed the latest version is secure from his attack.īut by the time Owens had informed Apple, malicious hackers had already started exploiting the issue, according to Jaron Bradley, a Mac expert at cybersecurity company Jamf, which published research into the attacks on Monday. Owens informed Apple, which fixed the bug in beta versions of the new Big Sur OS this week. That gave him remote control over the test Mac. When he clicked on the download, it ran without any of the popups that should’ve warned he was about to run unapproved software.
When Owens copied those techniques and tested his mock malware, he did it on an up-to-date macOS with the Gatekeeper settings set to the most restrictive. That came after he discovered Appify, a legitimate tool that had also managed to get past Gatekeeper checks back in 2011 with a tool allowing developers to create simple macOS apps with just a script.
He found that certain scripts within apps were not checked by Gatekeeper. The bug was first reported to Apple by security researcher Cedric Owens, who discovered it in mid-March. That XProtect update will happen automatically and retroactively apply to older versions of macOS. An Apple spokesperson said the company has now addressed the issue in macOS 11.3 and updated XProtect, its malware detection, to block the malware using this technique.
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