How to remove trojan from time machine?

Question

How to remove trojan from time machine?

Sophos detected a trojan, "Troj/Agent-ACOQ" on my Mac in July. I used Sophos to clean it off my Mac, but Sophos now reports it is on my Time Machine backups going back to the time it first appeared on the Mac.

Since Sophos does not report it on my active disk, can I assume it's no longer there - i.e. my Mac is clean?

And if so, can I delete it from time machine by deleting all the backups up to a few days before its first appearance on Time Machine?

Thanks,

Wabbit

MacBook Air, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.3), 250 Gb SSD, 4 meg ram, mid 2011 13"

Posted on Sep 28, 2013 2:06 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

macjack

Level 10

111,174 points

Sep 28, 2013 2:14 PM in response to Wascally Wabbit

As you can see that only affects Windows.

http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/Tr oj~Agent-ACOQ.aspx

Are you running windows? At any rate it's off your Mac and will do no harm in Time Machine. I would leave it, or start a new time machine backup. I don't know any way to selectively delete from TM.

You may find it here...

http://pondini.org/TM/Home.html

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Answer 2

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Sep 28, 2013 4:27 PM in response to Wascally Wabbit

If you feel it's necessary to delete a file that is completely harmless to your system from your backups, select it in a snapshot, then right-click or control-click. From the popup menu, select Delete All Backups. Confirm. Exit Time Machine.

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Answer 3

Sep 28, 2013 11:46 PM in response to Linc Davis

Thanks, Link and macjack,

Yes, I do run Windows 7 on my mac (in VMWare Fusion), but if I have a problem with Windows, I won't be trying to restore it from Time Machine.

I'll simply leave it where it is and tell Sophos to stop reporting it.

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Answer 4

Sep 29, 2013 3:05 AM in response to Wascally Wabbit

Your problem is Sophos. It is not only wasting your time (and ours) by detecting spurious faults, it is also slowing down your entire system. If I were you I would uninstall it ASAP.

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Answer 5

Sep 29, 2013 7:34 AM in response to Tom in London

I installed it ~ 6 months ago after reading several articles saying it's unwise to run even a Mac without some kind of protection. Is there an alternative that doesn't slow down the system, but that works when it's needed?

I didn't notice any appreciable slowing of my system after I installed it.

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Answer 6

macjack

Level 10

111,174 points

Sep 29, 2013 7:57 AM in response to Wascally Wabbit

You may want to read this...

http://www.thesafemac.com/mmg/

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Answer 7

Sep 29, 2013 8:32 AM in response to macjack

Thanks, a useful article that puts the risk into perspective.

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