Apple + Security & Privacy

While Snow Leopard, Apple’s new version of its Mac OS X operating system, contains a number of security enhancements (such as this very limited anti-malware feature), it could have had more, according to an article in The Register. “Known as ASLR, or address space layout randomization, the measure picks a different memory location to load system components each time the OS is started.” This feature – ASLR – is only partially used in Snow Leopard. “The halfhearted attempt at implementing ASLR has been a chief complaint of security researchers since Leopard, Snow Leopard’s predecessor.” Security researchers contacted for the article in The Register say that ASLR has not been improved since Leopard, and remains partial.

However, some new hardening features have been implemented. “One, called DEP, has been greatly expanded in Snow Leopard. It prevents shellcode and similar data that is supplied by a user from being executed by the OS.” And sandboxing has been extended so certain system components are limited in the actions they can carry out.