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Mac Security Question

M

macgeek77

macrumors regular
Original poster
May 24, 2006
153
0
I probably have nothing to worry about, but I am worried that I have downloaded some sort of virus or spyware that could ultimatly destroy my mac and then hurt my friends and family who use PC's. SO I am going to wipe my hard drive. Is there any way for viruses or spyware to somehow uncover files or stuff from the operating system I erased? Like, uncover erased files? Thanks for any help.:(
 
"could ultimatly destroy my mac" I like that.

Odd. There has been a flux in these "I think I have a virus" threads lately. I wonder what is driving that.

You have not contracted any viruses and you are being paranoid. The only way you can pass on a virus to a PC is if you move a .exe file from your Mac to a PC, and if you do that you are doing that knowingly because no malware can control what your Mac does.

And as the Carrot Jew asked, what makes you think you have something wrong?
 
I think that if there really was a mac virus out there in the wild that this forum would be among the first to know about it. And when you're talking about uncovering data after the directory has been destroyed, its near impossible, especially if you wipe it multiple times. So you've really got nothing to worry about. ;)
 
macgeek77 said:
I probably have nothing to worry about, but I am worried that I have downloaded some sort of virus or spyware that could ultimatly destroy my mac and then hurt my friends and family who use PC's. SO I am going to wipe my hard drive.
Click to expand...

Go ahead if you want to, but the likelihood that your Mac is infected is slim to none, and the chance that you could risk a networked PC is also slim to none...and, well both slim's are out of town for the weekend. ;)

What is happening quirk-wise that makes you think the computer is infected?

Have you tried repairing disk permissions or using a program like Yasu to clear out the system caches? Do one (or both) of those things and you should be fine. OS X doesn't need to be reinstalled every 6-9 months like Windows does. :) (Or maybe that's just my experience because I get fed up with the slow feeling Windows gets around that time and rather than spending the time running defrag, disk cleanup, etc. and other utility apps, I just start from scratch again.)
 
This is a mad carrot:


disgusting-carrot.jpg



I'd be more worried about other such vegetables and their madness than I would be about viruses for Macs. If your Mac isn't behaving correctly the try the wise zero2dash's excellent troubleshooting techniques. In addition, create a new user account in System Preferences and see if the quirks follow you there.
 
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