Apple pushes antivirus for Mac users.

Post Reply New Topic

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7760344.stm

Apple has urged Mac owners to use anti-virus software.

In a note posted on its support site in late November, Apple said it wanted to "encourage" people to use anti-virus to stay safe online.

The move is widely seen as a response to the growing trend among cyber criminals of booby-trapping webpages that can catch out Mac users.

Before now Mac users have been largely free of the security problems that plague Microsoft's Windows.

Fresh threat

The support note recommends that Mac owners install one or more of three anti-virus products.

Advice on the site said: "Apple encourages the widespread use of multiple antivirus utilities so that virus programmers have more than one application to circumvent, thus making the whole virus writing process more difficult."

Apple recommended users try McAfee VirusScan, Symantec Norton Anti-Virus 11, or Intego VirusBarrier X5.

The vast majority of malicious programs circulating online are aimed at Microsoft's Windows, largely because the software is used by so many people.

A handful of viruses have been written that targets Mac's OSX, but most have been demonstration versions only and few have had any significant impact on Apple users.

One virus, known as AppleScript.THT, could take control of a Mac and grab screenshots or keystrokes.

However, in recent months, hi-tech criminals have signalled a change in tactics away from e-mail borne viruses. Instead, many are infiltrating popular webpages in a bid to infect the machine of any and every visitor.

Many seek to steal valuable information such as login names, passwords or game accounts instead of trying to install themselves on a machine.

-------------------------------

Now, to me, the disturbing part about this is "The support note recommends that Mac owners install one or more of three anti-virus products.

Advice on the site said: "Apple encourages the widespread use of multiple antivirus utilities so that virus programmers have more than one application to circumvent, thus making the whole virus writing process more difficult.": Multiple AV programs? I thought that was a big no-no. I have Symantec on my Mac, but only because university policy and free copies of it encourage Symantec's use. I've never had need of an antivirus, and all I've noticed from Symantec has been a delay in downloading/installing things as I wait for the virus scans to invariably come up negative. Still have no AV for Ubuntu, because there's just no need. Even in Mac, as long as you aren't running as admin (of course, most Mac users do run as admin) you should generally be fine.

They have been talking about how the Mac OS X is due for a big virus attack for a few years now; not sure if this will be it or not.

I don't think they mean more than one on the same Mac; rather they mean that they want more than one to become popular.

"The support note recommends that Mac owners install one or more of three anti-virus products." This seems to indicate that they are encouraging the use of multiple AVs on a single machine.

Remember the good old days, when Apple supplied free anti-virus software with your .mac account?

Sorry, don't know how I missed that.

That is a very strange thing for them to say. I too have always been under the impression that having more than one copy of anti-virus software on your machine is not a good idea at all.

Doesn't the .mac account cost some excessive quantity of money? Or I might be thinking of that "mobileme" or whatever they call it. Really though, there's not a huge need for AV on a Mac. No one wastes time writing viruses for Mac, and you can avoid the ones that do exist by simply not being a moron. But then, Mac has traditionally been marketed at the computer illiterate.

I recently switched to a PC after 10 or more years of being a mac user. i'm happy.

That's not a switch. Macs are PCs. Or do you mean you switched to Windows? I hope you at least got XP rather than The Abomination Which Shall not be Named.

Having more then on running in *real-time* is not a good idea.

.Mac is the former name of MobileMe.

I think it's $99 a year or something crazy like that.

Yeah, $99/year, plus sales tax... I got in early, got ehallATmac.com, I'd hate to lose it; but then I also have edATscoogy.com for free, and I don't use anything but their email... I'm thinking of discontinuing it to save money.

It comes up late this month.

$99 a year is only $8.25 a month, which is about what most people would pay for webhosting alone...

Hey if they make a AV app for OS 9, I'll give it a whirl.

I think I remember having Norton for OS 9, but I could be wrong.

It was only a matter of time, once Apple started becoming popular again, that hackers would start screwing with them.

Regardless of popularity, isn't it A LOT harder to virus any UNIX system? I don't know anything about it, so I could be wrong.