What could be more exciting for hackers than exploiting a vulnerability in a widely used software without having to struggle too much? One such easy-to-exploit, but critical vulnerability has been discovered in ESET's antivirus software that could allow any unauthenticated attackers to remotely execute arbitrary code with root privileges on a Mac system.

All a hacker needs to get root-level remote code execution on a Mac computer is to intercept the ESET antivirus package's connection to its backend servers using a self-signed HTTPS certificate, put himself in as a MITM attacker, and exploit an XML library flaw.

Several antivirus products from security firm ESET had a critical vulnerability that was easy to exploit and could lead to a full system compromise.

The discovery of the flaw comes on the heels of a report that intelligence agencies from the U.K. and the U.S. are reverse engineering antivirus products in search for vulnerabilities and methods to bypass detection. The vulnerability in ESET products was discovered by Google security engineer and was located in their emulator, the antivirus component responsible for unpacking and executing potentially malicious code inside a safe environment so that it can be scanned.

Identified by researchers from antivirus firm ESET, there is a Trojan that can encrypt files on Android devices. The new threat is dubbed Android/Simplock. This Trojan not only encrypts your files on your Android devices, but also holds the phone hostage for a ransom.

After installing, Android/Simplocker. will scan the SD card for files with any of the following image, document or video extensions: jpeg, jpg, png, bmp, gif, pdf, doc, docx, txt, avi, mkv, 3gp, mp4 and encrypt them using AES [the Advanced Encryption Standard]. The malware will then display a ransom message in Russian asking for a payment.