Apple has pushed silent updates to MRT and XProtect

Apple has recently pushed another set of silent updates to the data files for security systems in macOS and OS X – this time for its Malware Removal Tool, MRT, and for XProtect. These realign version numbers correctly, and bring MRT to version 1.21, and XProtect configuration data to version 1.0 2094.

The latter adds protection from five recently identified malware products:

OSX.Bundlore.B
OSX.AceInstaller.B
OSX.AdLoad.A and B
OSX.Mughthesec.A

Although currently these appear to be fairly low risk, and have been analysed in detail by Patrick Wardle at Objective-See and others, this is an important pair of updates, and I recommend that you check that yours have been installed over the last day or two.

Checking in System Information / Software / Installations is unfortunately less helpful than it should be, as it does not reveal the detailed version numbers, which you can discover from LockRattler (free from Downloads above).

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1

Mike on August 25, 2017 at 10:30 pm

Is there a Terminal command that will force an update of these or do we have to wait for Apple to sneak them on a mac?

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  hoakley on August 25, 2017 at 10:37 pm
  
  There are two ways which should force the updates to be delivered:
  open the App Store pane, turn off the Install system data files and security updates item, and the Automatically check for updates box at the top, come out of the pane, go back in, and turn them both back on again;
  in Terminal, type the command
  sudo softwareupdate --background-critical
  then enter your admin user’s password.
  
  Check again half an hour later, and the updates should have arrived and installed, assuming that your internet connection remains good.
  Howard.
  
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Mike on August 25, 2017 at 10:41 pm

Thanks

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