Someone Found A Catastrophic Mac Bug That Lets Bloody Anyone Log In

Uh, so this isn’t particularly ideal. A few enterprising Twitter users uncovered a bug in the new version of macOS which would make it… entirely possible for literally anyone to access your computer, incredibly easily. Suffice to say: that is not good.

Basically, if you hit a login screen on a Mac running the latest version of High Sierra — 10.13.1 (17B48) – you can simply type ‘root’ into the username field and then hit Return a few times. After a couple of presses, it’ll let you in.

(Note: I verified this on a computer here in the PEDESTRIAN officers, but don’t bother trying it yourself. Exploiting this bug will create a ‘root’ account which someone with nefarious motives may exploit at a later point.)

Once someone is authenticated as ‘root’, they have full access to the computer. They can create accounts, delete accounts, access data, the works.

The issue doesn’t appear to affect Mac operating systems prior to High Sierra.

You’d have to assume that Apple will plug this hole in a couple of hours max. It was originally pointed out by Turkish software developer Lemi Orhan Ergin, who publicly called the company out with a tweet.

Obviously this a public service announcement to not leave your laptop running macOS High Sierra alone for the next few hours, now that every scoundrel, crim, cutthroat and lowlife knows how to weasel their way into your computer and steal your nudes.

Consider yourself warned, and stay tuned for updates from Apple on macOS.


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