Mac OS X is the Most Dangerous OS

if all these are true, what else can we do online besides watching youtube videos? i'de rather do what i usually do, get on with it and if my system got infected, reformat and reinstall everything oh wait, i have the image of my clean boot drive so no worry for me. mac osx is just my second drive just to try exclusive apps releases, win7 is my main bread and butter, nothing beats it period

... and riding in a car is the riskiest way to travel
... and buying food instead of growing or raising it yourself is the riskiest way to eat

I guess I should just unplug my computer and find a bomb shelter to hole up in for the rest of my life.

I remember when flame wars happened here daily, and Apple fan's would flame about Windows security flaws.

NOW look who's laughing, you're exposed to threats for months at a time.

Trend Micro sells fear... wait we have something that will protect you... Good one.

The most risky thing to own is a computer due to it's susceptibility to viruses, etc etc.

Technically can't even do that since YouTube is a Google site lol.

It's all about the user, in the end...

Mac OS X isn't currently nor has it been targeted by viruses or malware. This isn't because it is magically immune but because, at least so far, it hasn't had enough users to make it a target. But the idea of judging it based upon patch cycles when it wasn't under attack is ridiculous. There is no way to determine how well or how poorly Apple would crank out the patches if security flaws were being exploited, when at the moment they aren't.

Companies don't patch or even admit problems (like security flaws) even when they know about them UNTIL they start causing problems. That is universal across all markets, all goods, and all services.

the most dangerous thing to do it to be born because there is a 100% death rate.

anyway, the mac os will get hit harder and harder by malicious users since it is nor a larger target.

I've been telling people this for years. It's only a matter of time before Apple's security holes start getting exposed and we start having to clean and/or wipe out Apple devices due to virus infections.

Trend Micro virus scanner is a resource hog.

And the most dangerous thing for you online is being connected to the internet. Hurry up and pull the plug on your router.

... and the riskiest way of getting a cold is leaving your windowless room
... and jogging is more likely to twist your ankle
... and walking down the street is more likely to be hit by a car

never thought i was such a risk taker!

I have to agree. Mac OS X though a fine OS is not completely immune to attack. Actually, it is quite amazing that hackers have not started targeting it more.

@joytech22 Yeah! Thank god the flamee's can finally become the flamers!!! And you sound like a complete flamer.

Bu..bu..buu....but it doesn't have viruses and it's hack-proof!

What really matters is what really happens. I haven't heard of anyone getting serious malware on their apple products and 20 years later it's still the same thing with windows: buy anti-virus, have slow pc, get virus anyway, format-reinstall.....

Usually when a hacker designs a malware it tries to infect the largest amount of computers possible with it. The Mac OS still has a very small user base (it doesn't reach 10% worldwide) to become a target. Windows on the other hand is a tempting target because it has a huge user base (almost 90% worlwide). Unless the Mac OS user base increase considerably, it will never be a big target of malware.

Also almost always it's user own fault when infected by malware. Even with UAC introduced in vista most of the users simply ignore it's warnings and gives whatever app administrative permissions. When a software has administrative permissions it can do anything it wants in the system.

Also malware isn't an indicative of security holes.

But if your problem is security them you should use linux, it still has security flaws but are way less than in both windows and mac os.

There is only one problem with this article is that I know many people with PC that get malware infections all the time. I have been running MacOS for 7 years now and I never, ever had a single virus or malware infection. Even my PC at work with all it's anti-virus and internet security got infected at one point. My MacBook Pro never. If MacOS is more dangerous than Windows, I certainly have never experienced it.

Like I said most people have problems with malware mostly because of stupidity. I have a few clients that never had any issue with malware and other clients that their computer appears to be an archive of malware.

Most malware programmers prey on people ignorance and fear and not on security holes. If someone puts a warning message on a webpage that their computer is infected most people will simply click the button to fix it accept the UAC warning and install the malware. Using this method would also be easy to infect a linux computer, of course it wouldn't have much of an impact because the percentage of users with a fair amount of computer knowledge is way bigger than in Windows so they would know better.

There are a few things that Microsoft is to blame. Windows XP and past OSes never had UAC or sudo like linux and mac os x, so they should encourage people to use a limited account instead of a administrator account. Most of the malware problems would be solved in this manner. Then there's the dreaded autorun.inf, the option to execute automatically a program when certain media is inserted on the computer should have been turned off by default or at least make it easy to disable it. This would have solved many malware problems.

Malware is a byproduct of a big market share. As long windows has that huge market share it will also have a huge amount of malware. Other OS with a small market share will be relatively safe from malware.

Security holes is another matter, and usually they're used to hack into servers not to personal computers.

Id say its more of a user problem that you have...



Those are the tell-tale signs of a noob at the keyboard.

BS, Trend Micro doesn't make any money off of the OS X platform. OS X is virus free and solid. With a huge user base that is growing faster than any other OS.

The Mac OS X is not virus/malware free only someone blind would make that claim. Even Linux has virus/malware. They may have very little malware writen for them specially compared to windows bu that doesn't make them free of it.


I guess this is the reason why it took Windows 7 till December to overtake all versions of the Mac OS X in terms of market share. Keep in mind that Windows 7 achieved the RTM milestone at the end of July and was made available to the general public at the end of October. It only needed less the half a year to achieve what apple achieved in almost 10 years.

Matter of time before Mac's are attacked more, plus Mac has more products to attack, mod, and hack giving them a cushion for hackers to like them and want to hack them. For all that doubt, everybody loves a challenge and so do hackers......commence operation Apple Sauce.

IZ A MAC!! I LIKE APPLES!@!!!

I think what has been missed is the parameters for the attack has changed, Windows PC used to be prime targets due to their large market presence, the prime use of an infected PC was control, so the PC itself can be further utilized in other activities which may prove more profitable, info stealing capabilities were later added, but this caused unnecessary bloat given the primary role of infection, given a few hundred compromised PCs only a handful may have profitable info.

Now the demographics for a Mac user is completely different, doesn't take a genius to realize Mac users tend to have more financial leverage, they are also less guarded about storing sensitive information and significantly less likely to have security software, sure there are less of them but the chances of profiting from each one is far higher

a really smart malware programmer targeting Macs would not create something big and bloated that tries to get everywhere slowing the machine down sending out large swaths of information trying to always connect to the internet, he would create a small stealth instrument which remains hidden and imperceptible sending out very precise and select pieces of information, in short the Mac user would think that they were not infected, for the malware author maintaining the status quo would be their most important weapon

Actually there is a bit of interest in hacking windows machines for information. Most enterprises use windows as their OS of choice.

I think this sets a new precedence of Apple Users being Dare Devils. That should be Apple's new slogan. Use a Mac and be manly facing the dangers of the internet head on with no safety harness.

sumbody needs to go bak at the artikel and fix all the speling and gramma mistakess.

QFT!

If people aren't worried about threats on their pc's, Trend would sell a whole lot less of their products.

@Vladislaus

thats a whole different kettle of fish requiring real research, if you plan on infiltrating a company for commercial information via a PC then your going have to use a extremely refined and highly targeted attack and more social engineering then facebook can wave a stick at, using a glut of zombie machines to send you every document on that machine would ensure that you be sifting for useful information for the better half of the next decade, also the legal and security resource a mega corp can point in your direction would scare even the most ardent anarchist