Adobe Flash Malware Posing As ‘New Update’ Found In 1 In 10 Macs

The Shlayer malware is in the focus of the crypto news around the globe as one of the recent scams circulating in the sphere. However, this Adobe Flash malware is nothing new – it was developed two years ago and discovered at the same time when it infected Mac computers.

The malware seems to be in the focus again and a report showed that 1 in 10 Macs have had it in the past. The recently published full report from the Russian security outfit Kaspersky details that there are around 32,000 unique variants of Shlayer which account for a staggering 30% of all malware detected by the company’s Mac antivirus products.

What is perhaps more stunning in the news is that the Adobe Flash malware was the most commonly encountered Mac malware of 2019 – and that it was seen at least once by 10% of users of Kaspersky’s Mac anti-virus products.

This leads us to the fact that one in ten macOS users have been hit by Shlayer as the Adobe Flash malware that is deadly. One caveat, however, is the fact that many Mac users are still not running any anti-virus solutions.

That said, the numbers can be even higher and Kaspersky’s data is skewed because it is gathered from Mac users who actually chose to run security software (and thus considered themselves more at risk). Alternatively, it could mean that Kaspersky is “under-reporting” the true level of Shlayer activity because there is no insight on the computers which are not running an anti-virus.

The Adobe Flash malware has been distribute via websites claiming to offer a live stream of a soccer match, software cracks or pirated episodes of popular TV shows. This is how the malware got in the Bitcoin news – and how unsuspecting users might have been directed to the sites and infected with it.

“These links were not added by the cybercriminals themselves: we found that all those malicious domains had recently expired, and, judging by the WHOIS data, they now belong to a single individual. On the websites, the newly minted owner posted a malicious script that redirects users to Shlayer download landing pages. There are already over 700 such domains in total,” the report by Kaspersky read.

We advise all Mac users to run an up-to-date anti-virus program and detect for viruses such as the Adobe Flash malware before it is too late.