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Macs May No Longer Be Immune to Viruses
Bill writes "MSNBC reports that the combination of Apple's growing market share and their recent switch to x86 processors has made Mac OS X a new target for viruses. Unfortunately, it seems that many Mac users are in denial. '[Computer security expert Tom] Ferris said he warned Apple of the vulnerabilities in January and February and that the company has yet to patch the holes, prompting him to compare the Cupertino-based computer maker to Microsoft three years ago, when the world's largest software company was criticized for being slow to respond to weaknesses in its products.'"
Nor even markedly more resistant. They have just been less targeted.
Nonsense. Microsoft is the target of viruses and spyware because of Microsofts moronic design decisions and security policies, not because of marketshare.
No-one can deny that with growing popularity of OS X that it becomes an increasingly attractive target. Malware writing works on similar economics to regular software: this implies that malware will exist but be a niche deployment. So it is a concern, but not the end of the world, or of Apple, as the world likes to regularly predict.
/less/ vulnerable than the mainstream desktop OS. The thesis that using an intel processor increases security risks is not true - OSen don't allow direct hardware access as such, and how many script kiddies write x86 microcode?. Running Windows on a IntelMac may potentially increase security probems, and reduce the Macintosh (not OS X) brand reputation for security. It depends on how the 'wall' between x86 file access and OSX file access is implemented.
The article was mixed in accuracy. Many Mac users believe themselves to be invulnerable - the truth is they are currently
Nothing in IT or anywhere else is 100%. Currently OS X is more secure in many areas than its competitors. To maintain or improve on this, constant vigilence and innovation are required by Apple, ISVs and most importantly users.
Otherwise said:
Burglars break in houses with the most vulnerable alarm system, not because of the popularity of the alarm system.
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* Sigh *
I'd take an Apple spokeswoman's word over Tom Ferris's word. He's fairly good at finding crash bugs, but he frequently reports zero dereferences as "buffer overflows", etc. See his record in bugzilla.mozilla.org, for example, starting with bug 303433. I have no idea why the media keeps calling him a security expert.
Nonsense. Microsoft is the target of viruses and spyware because of Microsoft's moronic design decisions and security policies AND because of marketshare.
Virus writers are writing viruses to make profit; either by stealing information, creating botnets, or proliferation of unwanted advertising. They make more profit by exploiting more machines, so it's no wonder that the most common OS is also the most targetted.
The fact that it's so trivial to exploit Microsoft software is purely because of the moronic design decisions and security policies, not because of marketshare. But the fact that Microsoft is so frequently the target of virus writers is a function of marketshare as well.