Authenticate/Cancel Notification Box Pops up and then QUICKLY disappears automatic..

Once every hour or two a diag box pops up and then quickly disappears. It happens so fast I cannot do anything with it or even read what it says. I'm running Lion.

It appears to be the box that tells you that you need to authenticate to perform a certain action (has a yellow exclamation triangle). It's not the box that prompts for an Admin username/password. It gives you two options: "authenticate" & "cancel." On this particular mac I use a standard login/user & have a separate login dedicated to being the Administrator. When I do need to authenticate something I type in the Admin name & password. I'm not sure if the Admin/Username us submitted automatically after the first disappears. I have not seen the Authenticate box (that prompts for a password) appear afterwards.

Any idea what could be causing this? It's very annoying & I'm worried it could be some form of malware

I download a lot of Apps & stuff but am very cautious about what I install or allow to authenticate. I stay away from torrents (with an exception or two).

I'd like to figure out & fix what's causing this ASAP. It takes me out of fullscreen Netflix & is just so annoying.

any ideas?

[Note: I re-installed os x in July. I'm not sure when this started; It's been happening for awhile.

Does the pop up box appear when you're logged in as administrator or just when you're logged in with the user account?

chscag said:

Does the pop up box appear when you're logged in as administrator or just when you're logged in with the user account?

Click to expand...

Hi there.

It's appearing under my user account. I'm almost never logged in under the Admin account so I don't know if it would happen under that account or not. I guess it's It's worth finding out. I plan to watch Netflix tonight and I'll use the Admin account. Since it takes Netflix out of full screen it'd be a lot easier to spot it if it happens.

The reason I asked is I suspect when you're logged in the regular user account an action is taking place that requires permission to proceed. Although it is a bit strange that it opens and closes quickly.

Is there any particular reason you don't run at all times in the Admin account? A Mac is not like Windows if that's the reason you've got your accounts setup that way.

This is also happening to me

This happens to me as well, I am logged in as the Admin, Im the single only user. Has anyone figured out how to stop this pop up and what it is coming from?

same problem

did you find out what was wrong? I have the same problem...

thanks in advance.

couldnt fix it

Could of been a small virus/bug, I just re-installed osx from scratch and no more pop up. I still would like to find out what it is.