Any vulnerability in an operating system should be concerning because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up allowing malicious actors to gain access to your system in no time at all. Mac OS is often considered to be a great deal safer than other operating systems that are currently out there, but a recent vulnerability that was exposed definitely seems to suggest otherwise.
This vulnerability was uncovered by Microsoft, and suffice it to say that it has a lot of dangers associated with it that you would want to keep in mind. It’s called powerdir, and the way that it works is that it enables malicious actors to bypass any and all settings that you may have implemented through the OS’s Transparency, Consent and Control tech, so virtually every part of your system would be under someone’s control without you knowing about it.
The purpose of this feature was to make it so that various apps couldn’t perform any actions without first obtaining the consent of a user, which includes gaining access to the camera or microphone. Exploiting a vulnerability in this feature would enable malicious actors to obtain access to the camera and microphone, essentially allowing them to spy on you and get visual and audio feeds of you whenever they like which would obviously be a huge violation of privacy for most people.
With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that this vulnerability was patched in a recent Mac OS update that was rolled out last month. However, it just goes to show that even the most secure operating system in the world can have vulnerabilities associated with it, so you should be careful about the files that you download and keep checking on your computer to make sure that no one has obtained illicit access to it.
H/T: MS.
Read next: Most Users Are Unaware That Their Passwords Are Compromised, New Study Shows
This vulnerability was uncovered by Microsoft, and suffice it to say that it has a lot of dangers associated with it that you would want to keep in mind. It’s called powerdir, and the way that it works is that it enables malicious actors to bypass any and all settings that you may have implemented through the OS’s Transparency, Consent and Control tech, so virtually every part of your system would be under someone’s control without you knowing about it.
The purpose of this feature was to make it so that various apps couldn’t perform any actions without first obtaining the consent of a user, which includes gaining access to the camera or microphone. Exploiting a vulnerability in this feature would enable malicious actors to obtain access to the camera and microphone, essentially allowing them to spy on you and get visual and audio feeds of you whenever they like which would obviously be a huge violation of privacy for most people.
With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that this vulnerability was patched in a recent Mac OS update that was rolled out last month. However, it just goes to show that even the most secure operating system in the world can have vulnerabilities associated with it, so you should be careful about the files that you download and keep checking on your computer to make sure that no one has obtained illicit access to it.
H/T: MS.
Read next: Most Users Are Unaware That Their Passwords Are Compromised, New Study Shows