Ars Technica has chimed in with its thoughts on the Mac virus announcements from last week, and came to the conclusion that itis really much ado about nothing. The Leap-A trojan, which is disguised to look as if it is a screenshot of Mac OS X 10.5, requires several steps on the part of the recipient to make it work, and the supposed Bluetooth exploit takes advantage of a potential security hole that Apple addressed several months ago.
Symantec rated Leap-A, or Oompa-Loompa, with its lowest threat rating, Level 1, ranking it as fairly harmless. In fact, Leap-A counts as little more than a proof-of-concept.
Although Mac users are still fairly safe when it comes to system security issues, viruses, trojan horses, and other malware, they should still be vigilant. Eventually someone is likely to find a way to write a malware application that can cause Mac users headaches.The higher level of security that Mac OS X offers, however, is likely to protect us for a while longer.