As a website owner, I’ve been worrying about the potential for AI-driven hacks.
An AI-powered attack on the Cult of Mac website appears inevitable. And because we’re a small business without a ton of resources, I’m worried about how we’re going to protect ourselves — and how we’re going to react when the attack comes.
Years ago, our website was infected with a very clever Trojan that flummoxed several professionals we worked with. And it was only fixed by the random intervention of a third party.
The Trojan posted hundreds of invisible spam links to old posts and comments.
Posting to older, unmonitored content was clever. And in addition, the links and accompanying text were invisible to humans, but readable by machines (it was an SEO play).
When we discovered it and tried to remove it, the Trojan would just pop back up the next day.
It proved to be a tricky sucker — infecting and reinfecting the site over several weeks as we attempted to eradicate it and block future infections.
Cleverly, the malware wiped system files and database logs to cover its tracks. IIRC, it left no trace of itself whatsoever, except for the spam.
It bedeviled our tech guy, and the tech experts at our hosting company at the time.
It was only spotted in some obscure web server logs (it didn’t have access to the server’s files) by a phone-support technician working for our content delivery network — a most unlikely candidate to be troubleshooting our website woes.
But with the info provided by the tech, we were finally able to delete and block the Trojan.
The Trojan’s trickiness is apparently standard practice, which makes it extremely troubling to read about the uncanny hacking abilities of the latest AI models.
Here, for example, is how Anthropic’s Mythos AI broke one of Apple’s strongest security plays in just a matter of days.
And this isn’t just some small-beans thing. Apple claimed its system is “the most significant upgrade to memory safety in the history of consumer operating systems.” (Welp!)
Also in today’s newsletter:
The upcoming versions of the HomePod mini speaker and Apple TV 4K sound pretty great — if and when we ever get to see them.
Just as Apple turned the lemon of the iPhone’s under-screen sensors into Dynamic Island lemonade, the company’s eyeing a similar it’s-not-a-bug-it’s-a-feature play with the upcoming smarter Siri.
🔥 DEAL OF THE DAY: For antisocial homebodies like me, a video doorbell is a modern must-have. This model’s smart thermostat integration looks great! On sale for nearly 20% off.
Is it just me, or is the tech in this TV backlighting system ridiculously OTT?
Wow, was it really 20 years ago?
We had fun on the Cult of Mac podcast discussing iOS 27 — and screwing up my iPhone Home Screen!
— Leander Kahney, EIC.
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One more thing ...
That was one of the things that came out most clearly from this whole experience [with cancer]. I realized that I love my life. I really do. I've got the greatest family in the world, and I've got my work. And that's pretty much all I do. I don't socialize much or go to conferences. I love my family, and I love running Apple, and I love Pixar. And I get to do that. I'm very lucky.
Today’s poll
What's the biggest AI danger?
Results from yesterday’s poll:
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