Comments on: Is Anti-Virus Software Required On Mac OS X?

By: my security shield virus

my security shield virus — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 03:17:00 +0000

Antivirus is necessary for Windows and Mac!

By: Scott Jarkoff

Scott Jarkoff — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 02:44:49 +0000

Nice way to just pick out eight words out of context. How about you read the entire statement and the "entire diatribe" rather than finding some piece that matches an argument you would like to make.

The average OS X user who does not engage in risky online behavior will not need to run anti-virus software at this juncture.

That is right there in the conclusion of the "entire diatribe." Did you not read it on purpose? Also consider reading Rich's comment above for further clarity on our recommendation.

By: JC

JC — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 18:32:37 +0000

No they are not.

By: JC

JC — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 18:26:23 +0000

” OS X is just as exploitable as Windows” You pretty much discredited your entire diatribe in this one statement.

By: Remove Spyware

Remove Spyware — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 15:05:11 +0000

Yes, security applications are necessary in Mac OS.

By: Rich Chuckrey

Rich Chuckrey — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 15:58:24 +0000

Michael: I don't believe we're blanket-advising folks 'not to use' AV on a Mac. I think what we're doing here is weighing the requirement for installing AV on OS X against current security risks and doing so in layman's terms. If you're a user on a current version of OS X (not running Windows in Fusion or parallel), and you're patched, and you're not surfing pornography or downloading unknown files, then [as the article states] “you probably do not need anti-virus software on your Mac.”

Granted – installing AV software on any system is an ideal step toward strengthening your virus protection — if you can afford the cost for an AV application and its performance hit on your system resources.

Installing AV software for 900 corporate Macs [like your environment] is a no-brainer. Installing AV software on a single home Mac with a patched OS X is debatable.

By: Michael Kamens

Michael Kamens — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 08:50:08 +0000

As an Information Security Officer with over 25 years experience I find your recommendation telling people not to use anti virus on the Mac irresponsible. I support over 900 Macs and 200 Windows computers and can tell you the the Macs not only are capable of being infected by root viruses but by numerous email viruses. Also, many use “parallel and/or VMware running Windows making them very prone to all the ills on the Internet. Additionally, even if you are a responsible web user, it is difficult to protect yourself from the crackers exploiting “sane” sites with exploits. We don't use Symantec for the reasons you state but use Sophos which is a Mac based anti virus. Unfortunately, it is a business software product and not sold to the consumer market.

It's okay to express your beliefs but the level of understanding of those reading your response varies too widely.

By: JustinLuke

JustinLuke — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 12:14:56 +0000

Really good points there. Big business has a hand in creating some of the viruses and an even greater hand in blowing them out of proportion. A couple years back a virus was traced back to the creator who claimed the music industry payed them to attach viruses to torrent files to deter people from stealing music.

By: Scott Jarkoff

Scott Jarkoff — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 22:55:52 +0000

Firefox is definitely a memory hog on OS X. It is one of the major drawbacks, thus leading to the allure of Safari, which has no problem remaining speedy while not endlessly sucking away your resources. I've noticed that if Firefox is not shut down every now and again then it will ultimately eat your system until there are nothing but crumbs laying on your desk.

By: Scott Jarkoff

Scott Jarkoff — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 22:53:16 +0000

I always use virus protection on my PC but never on my Mac. On the PC the performance hit is negligible while on the PC it is not noticeable – something is wrong with this picture methinks. If the Symantec's and McAfee's want to see adoption of their anti-virus applications for OS X then they better up their game!

By: caffeine head

caffeine head — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 21:50:16 +0000

I've heard from multiple sources that the Conficker worm wouldn't be a threat to Mac users, thank goodness

By: Gregroy

Gregroy — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 18:50:06 +0000

Yah, I was just thinking that it's been a while since a major virus was released, but then maybe I've been out of touch. And I was thinking that given the crappy economy this would be the ideal time to boost Symantec's and McAfee's sales by releasing the biggest and baddest virus of all time. Call me a cynic but big business has earned every bit of it's bad reputation, so I'm wondering just how big the staff is on their pro-virus team. After all, they would go out of business if all these malicious nerds with an attitude and nothing better to do stopped trying to take over everybody's computer. I've always wondered how it benefited them to do what they do, and it would make perfect sense if they were getting paid to do it. It's exactly what big government (e.g. U.S.A.) does. They create problems to justify their existence and expansion. Well, maybe I'm wrong and there really are a bunch of bored nerds out there with unlimited time and money who simply want to make everybody else miserable. Let's hope so.

As for my Mac, the biggest problem I get is Firefox sucking up all the memory and CPU. I actually installed McAfee's Virus Scan a while back but it never runs and I can't figure out how to make it do anything – probably a blessing in disguise. So I'll just leave it as is. And my biggest worry about viruses is that my mother might forward some infected attachment (she likes forwarding cool stuff that she gets from other people) in email and I'll be stupid enough to open it. But like you said, even then the possibility that it will infect a Mac is pretty low. And that reminds me – I must backup all of my important data immediately.

By: Xander

Xander — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 12:59:43 +0000

Personally I think it depends on your sensibility, but generally- no.

There's just not enough out there at the moment to warrant an anti-virus with the Mac platform. That is to say- you don't click Yes to every dialogue box and type your password in whenever a strange application asks you to. That's just plain common sense. As much as I ever do is run ClamXav once or twice a year, takes an hour or so while I grab my dinner and it always comes back negative. (Only time it hasn't was when someone sent me a Windows-only virus and it picked up on that.)

It's not just the general Mac reasoning that makes me say this. Apps like Norton for Mac are horrible for slowing it down. My brother picked up a MacBook via his University and had Norton pre-installed on it (long story) so I tested out Photoshop with and without it. Found that rendering and saving a large image was hugely faster (i.e. 30 seconds from 50 seconds) without Norton. It just slows down osx and therefore your machine's life.

I'm still wary of course, times do change. Snow Leopard has added in a number of extra security features ( http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=1325 ) which should sort out various methods of attacks which have been used before, but I still keep an eye open for important updates.

By: JustinLuke

JustinLuke — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 12:42:10 +0000

Not required. Had several macs for about 6 years now with no problems. Then again I don't use anti virus on my PC's either. I just know how to take care of them. Why would I put a program on my computer that is know to significantly slow it down? Doesn't that kinda defeat the purpose?

By: Pete

Pete — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 07:48:59 +0000

Fair shout and something I've always maintained that if you browse safely then you've got very little chance of being exposed to nasties. Thank you very much Scott for going over this and it's really put to bed the little niggles I had.

By: JoshuaRJones

JoshuaRJones — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 07:07:25 +0000

I continue to say the following: I am the firewall.

People who get viruses are messing around in things they shouldn't. Mac or Windows. I haven't gotten a virus for a good year and half so far.

By: YorickPeterse

YorickPeterse — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 04:15:30 +0000

Finally someone who can explain exactly why OS X isn't safer that Windows, it's always a pain to discuss these sort of things with Apple people :)