smells like malware
Dec. 25th, 2014 02:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cellioSo there I was on my Mac (Mini), typing something in Chrome, when I suddenly got a pop-up that said "you need to restart" in about six different languages. The keyboard and mouse were unresponsive. That sure smelled like malware, except that I'm pretty careful about that, haven't installed anything lately, and haven't visited any new or suspect web sites lately. So I pulled out my phone to see what Google had to say (yay for device:person ratios higher than 1:1!).
I've had this Mac for about five years. I've never seen a kernel panic before. Huh, weird. I wonder what caused it. I wonder if there's anything I should do about it (other than report it to Apple, which I did when it asked me if I wanted to). Google is not so helpful with these questions, at least so far.
It occurs to me that Apple could probably make that pop-up look less like malware and more like it came from them, except wouldn't we expect any malware author to do that too? So maybe that didn't matter and we each learn what this looks like the hard way once.
I've had this Mac for about five years. I've never seen a kernel panic before. Huh, weird. I wonder what caused it. I wonder if there's anything I should do about it (other than report it to Apple, which I did when it asked me if I wanted to). Google is not so helpful with these questions, at least so far.
It occurs to me that Apple could probably make that pop-up look less like malware and more like it came from them, except wouldn't we expect any malware author to do that too? So maybe that didn't matter and we each learn what this looks like the hard way once.
(no subject)
Date: 2014-12-26 12:47 am (UTC)• "You need to restart" - Kernel Panic - can be caused by OS X and/or third party software, run through the Steps below
• Also see: You need to restart, panic report assistance (https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-5302)
My 2007 Mac mini has all of a sudden started crashing. It has done it at least a half a dozen times today. The only indication I have is all of a sudden I will get a message in the middle of screen telling me to hold the power button down until it shuts down and then restart it. After restarting I get a message asking if I want to send a message to Apple with the problem details. Here is some of the detail report -
Interval Since Last Panic Report: 94458 sec Panics Since Last Report:...[tl;dr][Post #4 in the thread] (http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=14779599&postcount=4)
Ok if its not a case of overheating what do you think is causing the shut downs?
Launch Activity Monitor and change "My Processes" at the top to "All Processes", then click on the CPU column heading once or twice, so the arrow points downward (highest values on top). Also, click on the System Memory tab at the bottom. Then take a screen shot, scroll down to see the rest of the list, take another screen shot and post them.
Im pretty sure the pop up screen said something about a kernal which I thought was what prevents my laptop overheating.
The kernel is part of your Mac operating system. What pop-up screen? Did it look like this?:
If so, that's called a kernel panic. If it doesn't happen again, or very infrequently, don't worry about it.
In most cases, kernel panics are not caused by an issue with your Mac. They are most likely caused by an issue external to your Mac. If the kernel panic doesn't happen again within a few weeks, you don't need to troubleshoot further.
"You need to restart your computer" (kernel panic) message appears (Mac OS X v10.5, 10.6) (http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3742)
HTH!
(no subject)
Date: 2014-12-26 04:48 am (UTC)I really should get myself a can of compressed air. It's possible there's dust in there, after all, but I'm sure not going to open the case on something as small and finicky as a Mini. But there may be things I can do from the outside.
(BTW, I use a milk crate, inverted over the Mini and the external drive, to keep cats off of it. So at least I don't have cats sleeping on it and depositing hair therein.)
(no subject)
Date: 2014-12-26 06:48 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2014-12-26 07:09 am (UTC)Include a URL or search term that gets you to an (https://) apple.com page describing it?
Text pointing out that it's not asking you to do anything odd with the reboot, just what you would have done at nextd shutdown anyway?
(no subject)
Date: 2014-12-26 05:58 pm (UTC)Text pointing out that it's not asking you to do anything odd with the reboot, just what you would have done at next shutdown anyway?
That probably would have made me more suspicious, actually. Yes it was only telling me to reboot, but there is legitimate software that only completes installation after a reboot, so it's not too much of a stretch to think that there might be malware that needs a reboot too -- so of course they want me to do that as soon as possible.
Include a URL or search term that gets you to an (https://) apple.com page describing it?
That's an excellent idea. The URL would be better because Apple controls it (search results can vary) and can keep it up to date. Because the user will have to use a different device to investigate, it should be easy to type.