May 14, 2026
Mac attack, buyer regret
First public macOS kernel memory corruption exploit on Apple M5
Apple’s shiny new Mac safety trick got cracked, and buyers are spiraling
TLDR: Researchers say they found the first public way to fully take over an M5 Mac despite Apple’s headline security feature. Commenters are split between demanding proof, joking it’s AI hype, and regretting buying the machine for safety in the first place.
Apple’s latest bragging point for the new M5 Mac chips was supposed to be a fancy built-in safety system that stops a whole class of nasty hacks. Then researchers marched into Apple Park with a laser-printed report and said, essentially, “about that.” Their claim: they built the first public exploit that can still reach full control of a Mac with this new protection turned on. In plain English, they found a way for a normal user account to climb all the way to root, the all-powerful admin level.
But the real fireworks were in the comments. One camp was instantly hungry for receipts, with people grumbling that the post was “light on the details” and demanding to know how Apple’s big new defense got beaten. Another camp went straight to meme mode, joking that “even Apple is making up fake vulnerabilities to hype up Mythos,” a wink at the article’s repeated mentions of the AI tool that helped find the bugs. And then there was the most relatable reaction of all: pure buyer’s remorse. One commenter basically screamed, I bought the M5 for this security feature and now I feel dumb.
There was also some delightfully nerdy side drama over money, with one commenter trying to price the hack like it was a rare sneaker drop, arguing it might be worth far more if packaged correctly for Apple’s bug bounty program. Meanwhile, another reader was less interested in the hack and more offended by the lack of juicy Apple Park field-trip gossip. The vibe? Part panic, part skepticism, part popcorn-fueled chaos.
Key Points
- •The article claims the researchers reported the first public macOS kernel memory-corruption exploit on Apple M5 hardware that survives Memory Integrity Enforcement.
- •The researchers say they disclosed the finding to Apple in person at Apple Park and will publish full technical details after Apple ships fixes.
- •The exploit is described as a data-only kernel local privilege-escalation chain for macOS 26.4.1 (25E253), starting from an unprivileged local user and ending with a root shell.
- •According to the article, the exploit path uses two vulnerabilities, normal system calls, and runs on bare-metal M5 hardware with kernel MIE enabled.
- •The article says Mythos Preview assisted bug identification and exploit development, and presents the result as evidence of AI-plus-human expert collaboration in vulnerability research.