QuickBooks 2006 and 2007 for the Mac users received a rude wake up call from Intuit over the weekend when the accounting applicationis auto-update feature began deleting useris Desktops. Many users are reporting the loss of gigabytes worth of data thanks to the updater.

The story seems to be the same for every QuickBooks user so far: After launching QuickBooks, they get an alert telling them a new software update is waiting. Once the update begins downloading, their Desktop directory along with all of the files on their Desktop, are deleted.

While some QuickBooks users have speculated that this may actually be some kind of exploit, there is no evidence so far to indicate this is anything other than a problem with Intuitis installer process.

Intuitis QuickBooks forums are filled with comments from disgruntled users that lost data along with their Desktop directories.

The company is advising users disable the auto-update feature until the problem is corrected. To disable the feature, do this:

• Launch Terminal. Itis in Applications/Utilities.
• Enter this command: defaults write com.intuit.QuickBooks2006 QBCheckForUpdatesKey NO
• Press Return.

If you have already lost data thanks to the auto-update and donit have backups of your important files, your only remedy is to rebuild your files, or use a data recovery utility like Data Rescue II from Prosoft Engineering.

[Thanks to TMO reader Paul Isaacs for the heads up.]