For years, everyone’s known that PCs are prone to malware and Macs are not. Just ask any Mac owner, they’ll condescendingly tell you so. Well, party’s over. A new malware program going by the name Mac Defender is making the rounds. It hides out on malware hosting websites and if you stumble upon one (weird link, someone gaming search engine optimization, whatevs) you might see a pretty aggressive pop up saying that you’ve been infected but if you download Mac Defender (sometimes goes by the names Mac Security or Mac Protector), you can get rid of it. Sometimes it even asks for your credit card info to “buy” this program. The program, of course, is malware. Apple tech support has been receiving four to five times more calls lately, mostly having to do with the malware. Apple fans have taken to insisting that they were way into an earlier version of the malware before it sold out.
There’s a lot happening in the world. Through it all, Marketplace is here for you.
You rely on Marketplace to break down the world’s events and tell you how it affects you in a fact-based, approachable way. We rely on your financial support to keep making that possible.
Your donation today powers the independent journalism that you rely on. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you.
