How To See If Someone Hacked Your Mac

Signs your Apple ID has been compromised

1. How To See If Someone Hacked Your Mac Download
2. How To Check If Someone Has Hacked Your Mac
3. How To See If Someone Hacked Your Mac Free
4. How To See If Someone Hacked Your Facebook
5. How To See If Someone Hacked Your Computer

Your Apple ID might be compromised if you receive an account notification from Apple for a change you didn't make, or if you notice account details or changes you don’t recognize. For example:

• You receive an email or notification that your Apple ID was used to sign in to a device you don't recognize or did not sign in to recently (for example, 'Your Apple ID was used to sign in to iCloud on a Windows PC').
• You receive a confirmation email from Apple that your Apple ID password was changed or your account information was updated, but you don’t remember making any changes.
• Your device was locked or placed in Lost Mode by someone other than you.
• You see messages you didn't send, or items you didn’t delete.
• You see charges or notices for purchases that you didn't make. Learn what to do if you see an unfamiliar iTunes Store or App Store charge on your credit or debit card statement.
• Your password no longer works, or it might have been changed or locked.
• You don't recognize some or all of your account details.

Feb 25, 2012  Find Out If Someone Was Using Your Mac with Console. This works best if you put a Mac to sleep while away, since what we’re looking for are system wake events. If you aren’t sleeping a Mac while gone from the computer, start doing so now to track this wake data. Apr 14, 2017  I wish this would be a joke. While I was working on my MacBook with a clean install of Mac OS Sierra, suddenly my speaker were playing static noise. I could here someone clicking with a mouse. If someone has access to your local network they may be able to do so without an IP address if they can get your MAC address. For remote hacking over an internet knowing the IP address is a necessary but not sufficient condition for access to the machine. If someone knows your IP address then they can scan your computer for open ports. It is not easy to tell if your computer has been hacked but it is extremely unlikely for any Mac to get hacked because they have the best security of all personal computers in the world. The only likely way to hack your Mac would be if you allowed someone to have physical access to it and you left it unlocked.

If you received an email, text message, or phone call that you're not sure is valid or you think might be phishing, here are some tips to help determine its legitimacy.

Gain control of your Apple ID

Mac users have a handy little way to see when their displays have powered on and off, which gives you a clue as to whether someone has been using your system while your away. (Unless, of course.

Mar 25, 2020  If you think your Apple ID is compromised, use these steps to gain control of it and review your account information: Sign in to your Apple ID account page. If you can't sign in or you receive a message that the account is locked when you try to sign in, try to reset or unlock your account. How to Tell If Your Mac Computer Has Been Hacked. Log in to your Mac OS computer using your regular user account. Click 'Applications' and then 'Utilities.' Double-click on 'Terminal.' A new window will open, with a prompt for text-mode commands. Type the following.

If you think your Apple ID is compromised, use these steps to gain control of it and review your account information:

1. Sign in to your Apple ID account page. If you can't sign in or you receive a message that the account is locked when you try to sign in, try to reset or unlock your account.
2. Change your Apple ID password and choose a strong password.
3. Review all the personal and security information in your account. Update any information that isn't correct or that you don’t recognize, including:
   • Your name.
   • Your primary Apple ID email address.* If you need to change your email address, update the features and services that you use with Apple ID, so that each one is using your updated Apple ID.
   • All alternate email addresses, rescue email addresses, and phone numbers.
   • The devices that are associated with your Apple ID, if you've already set up two-factor authentication.
   • Security questions and answers. If you think they might be easy to guess, you should change your security questions.
4. Check with your email address* provider to make sure that you control every email address associated with your Apple ID. If you don't control the email addresses associated with the Apple ID, you should change the password for the email address or use a different email address.
5. Set up two-factor authentication for your Apple ID. This additional security feature is designed to prevent anyone from accessing your account, even if they know your password.

* In China mainland and India, you can use your phone number as your Apple ID.

If you completed the steps above and think your account might still be compromised, contact Apple Support.

Know which Apple ID is signed in to your device

If you're signed in on your device with an Apple ID that you don't recognize, use these steps to sign out, then back in with a different Apple ID. To make sure that you're signed in to Apple IDs that only you control or trust, you can check the following settings on each of your devices:

iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch:

• Settings > [your name]
• Settings > [your name] > iTunes & App Store
• Settings > Messages > Send & Receive
• Settings > FaceTime

Mac:

• System Preferences > Apple ID
• System Preferences > Internet Accounts
• Messages > Preferences > Accounts
• Facetime > Preferences > Settings
• Mail > Preferences > Accounts
• Calendar > Preferences > Accounts

You should also check iCloud for Windows, your AirPort Time Capsule or other AirPort Base Station, and your Apple TV (for iCloud Photos or Home Sharing).

Make sure your Apple ID is secure

Because you use your Apple ID for so many Apple products and services, you should make sure that your Apple ID is as secure as possible. You should be the only person who knows your password and can sign in with your Apple ID. If someone you don’t know or don’t trust can sign in with your Apple ID, your account is not secure.

Your Apple ID might not be secure for the following reasons:

• Someone else created an Apple ID on your behalf, or you’re using an Apple ID that was already signed in when you received your device.
• You’re sharing an Apple ID with family or friends. Your Apple ID is your personal account. If you want to share purchases with a family member, use Family Sharing. With Family Sharing, you can share a calendar, photos, reminders, and more without sharing your Apple ID.
• You don’t recognize the Apple ID that is signed in on your device.
• You shared your password with someone else intentionally or unintentionally. For example, someone else selected your password for you, you told someone your password, or you entered your password on a phishing site.
• You don't have control of the email address or phone number associated with your Apple ID.
• Your password is weak or is compromised.
• You share your devices with someone else, your devices are not protected by a passcode, or your passcode is easy to guess.

If any of the above are true, you should reset your password as soon as possible and review your account information.

Every day we see news about computers being hacked and how the cybercriminals make money off people clueless about the protection of their assets.

For someone not very technical, it may sound as if hackers are so powerful, and the only way to hide is to shut down all devices and go off the grid completely.

However, the truth is that there are several simple things one can do to make sure that we are reasonably safe when browsing the internet without affecting our ability to access the information we need.

Whether or not someone can hack into the computer or phone through WiFi depends on a person’s proximity to the WiFi router. If a cybercriminal in the range of access to the WiFi router, they can connect to the local network and perform various attacks, such as Man In The Middle attack.

If the hacker is outside of the WiFi range, then the way they attack will be different.

Let’s consider various scenarios of how the computer can be hacked and ways to protect your devices.

Hacking Computer Through Local WiFi

As you probably guessed, it is much easier to hack the computer, which is in close proximity to the hacker’s device.

For instance, your neighbor can connect to your WiFi and use your internet for free. Or you may connect to the free WiFi in the cafe or hotel, but someone already hacked the network, and now everyone, including you, is a potential target.

How To See If Someone Hacked Your Mac Download

Or maybe you are using the office WiFi, and it was also hacked.

And it doesn’t have to be a computer, such as a Mac or PC. Your smartphone, iPhone, or Android, which uses the WiFi can be hacked as well.

Let’s see what hackers can do if they are physically connected to the WiFi you are using.

Man in the middle attack

If you have the internet at home from a cable, DSL, or fiber-optic provider, you have a router. Your computer does not directly connect to the internet; it sends and receives data by directing it through the router.

In layman terms, the process is the following:

1. Your computer or phone finds a WiFi router.
2. After submitting the correct password, the router sends back its MAC address. MAC address is an identifier of computer components, and in theory, it should be unique across billions of devices on the planet. The network card on your computer also has a unique MAC address.
3. After you get the MAC address of the router, all internet activity will be going through the router. In the pic below, there is a MAC address next to each device on the local network, and the router’s address is 11:22:33:44:55:66.

When a hacker connects to the local WiFi router, it also finds the MAC address of the router. The hacker changes his computer’s MAC address to be the same as routers one (11:22:33:44:55:66 in the pic below).

Now, all devices on the local network connect to the hacker’s machine, and then the data flows to and from the router. So the hacker becomes a man in the middle (MITM).

Once this happened, the hacker can read all outgoing requests and incoming data using various tools that collect such data.

This means every time you enter a username and password on some web site or enter your credit card number, and it gets saved on the hacker’s machine. Also, every URL you are visiting also gets saved.

There are some limitations, obviously. For instance, if the website uses the HTTPS protocol (S at the end stands for Secure), all traffic is encrypted between your computer and cybercriminals will not be able to crack it (in most cases).

However, if the web site uses HTTP, all data, including the password, is in cleartext.

So, if you want to avoid your data being stolen, always check that web site is using a secure protocol (HTTPS). In the browsers, the secure protocol is usually displayed with a padlock icon next to the URL.

Never enter passwords or financial information on web sites with HTTP!

How the router can be hacked

When it comes to your home WiFi, there are three ways for someone outside to connect to the router:

1. The router is not password protected
2. You tell the password. For instance, you told the guest the password, or she looked it up on the router (if you didn’t change the default one)
3. If the router is using an old authentication protocol

I am going to skip the first two and instead of focus on the last one. The authentication protocol used in with WiFi router is very important.

If your router is old, it is possible that it’s still using WEP protocol, then you should know that anyone who knows a little bit about hacking can hack the router literally in less than a minute.

So, if you have it enabled on your router, then go ahead and disable as I did.

What you should have is WPA2 with AES encryption. In the pic below, the authentication strength (protection from hacking) increases from top to bottom (WPA is less secure, and WPA2-PSK with AES is the most secure).

Some hackers employ a dictionary attack to crack WPA protocol, but it takes supercomputers to hack it. So as long as you are not a celebrity or a billionaire, nobody will spend so many resources to break into your network.

Usually, you can connect to the home router settings by going to the local IP address, such as http://192.168.0.1/.

How to tell if someone hacked your router

One of the sure routers hacked signs is the existence of an unknown device connected to the local WiFi network.

As I explained above, in order to perform a man in the middle (MITM) attack, the hacker must connect to the WiFI network first. And if he’s connected, you can see him too.

One way to find out the connected devices is through the router settings. Some routers allow us to see all connected devices and kick them out if needed.

Another way is to use a network scanner app. For instance, I found a cool app called Fing. The app is available for almost all platforms: iOS, Android, macOS, and Windows.

It is free (with ads) and doesn’t even require creating an account in order to use it.

One cool feature they have is scanning for open ports.

For instance, when I scanned my MacBook Pro, I found that remote desktop and screen sharing features were enabled, and anyone could connect to my Mac remotely.

How to protect from a MITM attack

While it is possible to scan and find unknown devices on the home network, this approach will not work with public WiFi networks, such as the one in Starbucks or the hotel.

You would never know if the public network was compromised. In this case, the only way to protect your privacy is to use a VPN (a virtual private network).

When connected to VPN, your computer or phone creates a secure encrypted channel with the VPN server. After the connection is established, all requests go to the VPN server. The server makes all requests on your behalf and returns the results back to you.

From outside, it looks like the computer is sending some garbage to and back to the same computer. Even if the hacker collecting the information, he won’t be able to tell whether you’re connecting to Google.com or MacMyths.com.

When choosing a VPN software, follow these best practices:

• Do not use a free VPN. They have significant limitations, and you know that good things are never free.
• Test for speed. Some VPS are significantly faster than others.
• Check the provider’s reputation. Since all requests now go through the VPN, technically, the VPN server becomes a man in the middle. So choose only reputable providers.

Personally, I am using NordVPN: it’s the fastest on the market and very inexpensive. It is available for multiple platforms: macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS, and Android.

If you use my NordVPN affiliate link you get a pretty steep discount for three-year plan for up to 6 devices.

Hacking Computer Remotely

We discussed ways to hack the computers and phones through local WiFi, but I know the question that most people ask is whether hackers can connect to the home network when they are on the other end of the world (or more than a hundred yards or meters away).

Fortunately, the answer is no, someone cannot get into your home network, even if they know the password if they are outside of the range (more than 300 feet).

Also, in most cases, hackers cannot get into your computer is off (link).

However, there are other ways to get into your system remotely. Do you remember a story of Bezos’s personal data being leaked?

In his case, he received a message on WhatsApp with malware attachment. When the malware was installed on his phone, it started sending the personal data to the server abroad.

Similarly, we are all at the risk of having malware installed on our computers and smartphones. Some malware open access to the device, so the hackers can access it remotely.

Or, the malware could be a keylogger, and in this case, even having HTTPS or a VPN will not help. A keylogger will record the keys pressed on the keyboard, and if it happens to be a credit card number, then the hacker will have it.

So, how to protect the devices from malware? You need to install an antivirus program.

There is a common myth that Macs cannot have viruses, but this is not true. I was able to inject my Mac with more than 100 malware samples when testing various antimalware solution.

You can check the results of my test and recommended antiviruses in my post: Best Malware Detection App for Mac.

How To Check If Someone Has Hacked Your Mac

Every time my friends and family ask me for a recommended antivirus, I go with Norton 360. It comes with the biggest bang for the buck and provides antimalware and other security features on all platforms. And it also has its own VPN!

Conclusion

We reviewed multiple ways how someone can hack into your phone or computer through WiFi. I also listed ways to prevent this from happening, which I wanted to reiterate.

If you worry about online security, consider investing in the following tools:

• VPN software
• Antivirus program

Be very cautious when connecting to public WiFi. I’d say if you don’t have VPN installed on a laptop or smartphone don’t use public WiFi, or at least avoid making purchases with a credit card or entering passwords.

If you are interested in the topic of security, there is a great course available on Udemy about ethical hacking. The instructor teaches how to hack computers ethically and most importantly what can you do to prevent from being targeted:

How To See If Someone Hacked Your Mac Free

Also, check my other post:

How To See If Someone Hacked Your Facebook

Photo credit: ©canva.com/cyano66

How To See If Someone Hacked Your Computer

Last Updated on