Two guys: One wearing body armour in Baghdad, the other wearing shorts and T-shirt in San Francisco. The one with body armour is more secure. The one in San Francisco is safer.
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Does this mean OSX isn't secure? :(
- Thread starter MythicFrost
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Two guys: One wearing body armour in Baghdad, the other wearing shorts and T-shirt in San Francisco. The one with body armour is more secure. The one in San Francisco is safer.
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if you could read between the lines, the only things that makes windows "more secure" is the fact that windows is more cluttered hence its harder to get into it.
that has more sides to it, like for example, user experience on both sides.. either remote access or sitting behind the screen.
if you are able to hack into a unix system, you are able to hack into windows...
id like to see someone hack into OSX/Windows without the first step that is USER MISTAKE.
i have an idea how to make computer more secure, REMOVE KEYBOARD AND MOUSE, majority of all hacks happen because of stupid users. (opening a port..)
Because Hackers like to use Macs. Such as
Kevin Mitnick
http://obamapacman.com/2009/09/kevi...minal-turned-security-consultant-is-mac-user/
So I may be wrong here, but doesnt it all just boil down to how the virus/trojan is distributed? I mean the fact that .exes do crap on their own without you knowing exactly what will mess up a PC in no time... Since Macs cant read them and until a mac file type emerges that is comparable to .exes, I'm not sure theres much to worry about. So arent macs more secure since any virus it comes across simply wont be recognized by the file architecture?
Sure you can say .dmgs automount and stuff, but it doesnt go beyond that. Altering your actual computer is all done manually by the user.
Sure you can say .dmgs automount and stuff, but it doesnt go beyond that. Altering your actual computer is all done manually by the user.
Care to provide the proof of this "fact"?
EDIT: Damn, TommyCo beat me to the punch.
I can't but this guy, making comments on the discussion after the article the OP mentions, can (in blue the comments he destroys with arguments):
I know this post is long, but after reading the very generalized and highly opinionated comments. I felt it was my duty to point out some actual facts.
One thing I dont see anyone talking about when arguments over which OS is more secure, stable, faster, etc is Is the OS more or less secure by itself, or after you have installed 10 or more applications on it?
An article came out a few years ago which made a claim that Windows Server was more stable and had more uptime that a Linux Server. This article was obviously attacked due to the fact that Windows critical updates alone cause more downtime than Linux requires. The humorous statement alone that if you install Windows and no other applications, and put that box in a corner and leave it alone for a whole year and perform NO patches and so on .Then yes, Windows would be better ..But lets be real .Who is going to use that Windows box in that way .No one ..
Ah, the "I know you are but what am I" defense. You have this backward. It's the Linux folks that always say "vulnerabilities in applications or runtimes (Apache, PHP, MySQL, etc) don't count as Linux vulnerabilities." On the other hand, the top server applications for Windows Server (IIS, SQL Server) have way, way better security track records than their Linux equivalents.
http://secunia.com/advisories/product/17543/?task=advisories
http://secunia.com/advisories/product/9633/?task=advisories
This independent article from a while back was later found to be sponsored by ..Microsoft.
Source?
To my point of this argument ..Windows installed by itself, with no applications installed and all critical updates applied and completely left alone Yes, it could be more secure than MAC OSX .or hell, even Linux or UNIX flavors .BUT Who is going to build a computer/server that has no application purpose.
This is a straw man. Nobody ever suggested that Windows should be used without applications, nor was this configuration ever used to tout the security of Windows servers.
So then we are forced to look at how well an OS can maintain its security when applications are installed and what happens when you put that OS in a REAL WORLD scenario ..OSX has for years kept the entire OS system files in a read only mode Applications do not have write access to any system files Windows cannot say this .Ever herd the Registry or Windows system file sharing. Microsoft themselves said back when Vista was being developed We tried to get rid of the registry and lock down the system files to a more READ ONLY like security structure However, due to the thousands of applications made for the Windows platform we are forced to conclude that this is simply not possible as it would require every Windows application to be re-written which would bankrupt the software world.
You just made that up. Nothing in that paragraph is true. Users do not have write access to system directories on Windows. They never did. Even Administrators don't have write access by default on Vista or Win7 without elevating.
One of the key advantages of the registry is its security model. Users have read/write access only to their per-user hive, and have only read access to the system hive. It has always been this way. Unlike, say, Linux - Windows was built to be a multi-user operating system from the very beginning.
Case and point .When you start to install Windows applications that REQUIRE access to the system32 and system folder and the dllcache directory and the system registry, etc, etc, etc .You will degrade Windows security and be at the mercy of the developer who created your application, which is why 99 percent of Windows apps require admin level control of Windows. OSX does not have this problem and NO apps run as root. Steve Jobs is a Software Nazi (Joking) who has so much control over OSX applications And no OSX application will ever be allowed to have a dependency on OSX system files .The application must be able to run from its own home directory, so if it tanks .it affects only itself .I can copy the Office 2008 folder or any other app folder from my mac to another mac and it will run with no install .everything it needs is in that folder .Lets see Windows do that .
Apps on Windows do not run as root. Most installers require admin privileges because this is how managed environments control who can and can't install software, and because admin privileges are required to register per-machine shared libraries, per-machine association handlers (like file extension / MIME type handlers, etc), and so on. But lots of applications can install per-user as well, or only install per-user (like Google Chrome) and don't ever require admin privileges to install.
Every OS X application ever has dependencies on system files. You clearly have no clue what you're talking about since that statement makes no sense at all. Further, applications on OS X frequently requires root privileges in order to install (like, say, Firefox, VMWare, Quicksilver, etc). In fact, one big gap in the OS X security model is that every installation asks the user for their password without a Secure Attention Sequence, meaning that it's trivial to steal a Mac user's password.
RSA Security and Symantec attacked Microsoft at the same time asking about UAC (User Access Control, some called it User authentication Control). The question was asked .
IF UAC will be Windows only way to control access to the system files and has the ability to be turned off by the user, after authenticating .What would stop an application from being installed with a virus and disabling UAC
Microsofts response
Nothing
Ugh. Wrong again.
UAC = User Account Control.
UAC doesn't control access to system files. ACLs do that.
Applications can't turn off UAC without already having admin privileges.
And how many people get tired of UAC and just disable it? So then what do you have .the same old Windows 2000 and XP security that will be degraded after each application you install. .
Wrong again. UAC is one of many security technologies introduced in Vista. Besides that, very few users disable it.
OSX Security (like it or not) will not change unless you tamper with the READ ONLY system files. Maybe thats why Snow Leopard has no changes ????
Security on Snow Leopard is a joke. There's no ASLR, no SAS or UIPI. NX support still isn't as good as Windows. BOTH systems grant read-only access to system files by default.
To people that say When mac has more market share it will have the same Windows problems Umm .Maybe you should look under the hood before saying that .
Umm, they have. They've seen that Windows is constantly attacked despite the far greater barrier to entry for attackers. Every security researcher says that Macs are trivial to exploit. So the explanation for the relative lack of attacks against Macs clearly isn't a matter of difficulty, but rather a lack of incentive.
Dude, I have read your response and all I can say is....Someone is in the dark and obviously has no enterprise experience. Hint!its not me!.. I am not going to have a "who's is bigger than who's" argument with you....But I personally work with large corporate software vendors and one of our biggest issues when deploying new software is telling software vendors that they cannot be installed with admin privileges and they cannot run their applications from the registry with global admin rights!.this forces them to go back and re-write their installers to use a lower priv service account and call out the specific reg entries the app needs access to. Any systems files the app needs access to the install must list those files and be given specific read/write access to those files. I have done this hundreds of times. So I don't need to be told by you that Windows apps don't requires sys file read/write access, and I am sure that any Microsoft .Net software developer would argue this with you as well!..have you ever packaged/compiled an app before!I am guessing not!.otherwise you would not say the things you said!.
I am a developer on the Windows shell team. I am intimately familiar with the Windows application model, and have released several applications independently of my work at MS (including Start++ among others).
Applications on Windows don't write to system file locations. If needed, shared libraries are installed by the Fusion APIs into the Side-By-Side assembly cache (WinSxS) or the GAC (for .NET stuff).
I'm quite confused about your "enterprise experience." Enterprise admins deploy software to managed desktops, they don't have users install them. Nobody should ever be changing registry ACLs or system file ACLs. Basically, none of what you said makes any sense at all.
You are clearly a Windows bias person and will stand by your man "Windows" just like a women who gets beat by her man and is too afraid to accept reality that its time to leave him!
Umm, what?
I like OSX very much!.I have VMware running a Windows 7 for the hundreds of apps I can't use in OSX!All OS's have their pros and cons, but if we are really going to focus on security!.then Windows is and has been at the back of the the line for some time!
No, it's an industry leader. Software development firms around the world look to Windows in defining their secure development practices. The "Secure Development Lifecycle" that originated from Microsoft has been adopted by a lot of ISVs, and I'd be surprised if several competitors (possibly including Apple) haven't integrated at least part of it into their process. They'd be very unwise to ignore it.
OH!..And that comment you made about IIS being far better than non-Microsoft Web Services!..DUDE!.You just confirmed you have no idea what you are talking about!..the only reason IIS is still used on the "INTRANET" of corp networks is due to .Net Framework apps!Its cool, people like the functionality and so on!..
IIS has little or nothing to do with any .NET technology. It's a web server, and by far the most trusted one, given its impeccable track record.
However!.I will gamble with you right now and challenge you to call the fortune 100 corps of America and ask them what web servers are sitting on their DMZ's (that's for public facing servers if you didn't know)!.IIS is NOT ALLOWED in the DMZ for MOST of these corps!.It has been hacked too many times and has proven to be non-trust-worthy for public facing sites. America Express was de-faced about 5-6 years ago!.running IIS!..AMEX does not allow IIS in their DMZ anymore!its all "something elseâ"!The same can be said for most of the banking and semi-conductor corps that I have personally worked for and other large corps that have SOME of the best and smartest people working for them.
IIS had 8 vulnerabilities since 2003, ZERO of which were rated "highly" or "extremely" critical, and only four rated at "moderate" which means they're at worst DoS attacks, all of which were in optional off-by-default components.
Apache has had 26 in the same time period, including 2 "highly critical" (remote code execution) and 10 "moderate" vulnerabilities.
How do you explain that? Not a SINGLE reported remote code execution vulnerability against IIS. Not even one. In 6+ years. Seriously, how are you arguing against that?
American Express is using IIS on at least three of their websites:
http://searchdns.netcraft.com/?position=li...icanexpress.com
Although those are just public facing sites. Their on-premise extranets are much more likely to be IIS.
Intel and AMD both use IIS:
http://searchdns.netcraft.com/?position=li...&host=intel.com
http://searchdns.netcraft.com/?restriction...osition=limited
Look at the top uptimes for webservers tracked by netcraft:
http://uptime.netcraft.com/up/today/top.avg.html
Out of the top 50, only ONE is running Apache! All of the rest are Windows Servers!
You need to go read some books before you respond again.....
Somehow, I don't think that's necessary...
Yes I read it.
All I saw was one claim. But how many hacks of real world UNIX/Linux/BSD based systems have we seen. As I have previously said, most of the worlds webservers (well over 80%) run some kind of *NIX based system, servers are where the big money really is, and yet it is Windows PCs that get hacked...
Why? Because they are easier to hack.
And I'm aware that he hacked the mac first 2 years running at hack to own. However he didn't hack OS X, he hacked Safari, which like most browsers is a weak link. However unlike Windows, the browser is a separate entity from the OS, so a critical weakness can be avoided by using a different browser (eg FireFox). In Windows, because IE is embedded into Windows Explorer (the shell of the OS), any browser security issues are a potentially much greater flaw.
This is true because why sell your exploit for a hundred thousand dollars on the black market when you can win a macbook air...
The computer prize is completely irrelevant, the guy this article is about said in an interview he never even used the mac he won. Nobody cares about the computers, theyre booby prizes.
There was no "user mistake" when he hacked the mac, he told the judges to go to a website (this is NOT user mistake, this is so they actually find the exploit, in the real world this can be any link you find on google) and then he immediately took control of their machine. It was completely stock with all updates and nothing modified.
Because servers never get hacked
You sound like an expert, how many computers have you hacked into?
??
Saying that OSX is hacked in minutes if not seconds at these hacking events is a little bit of a misleading statement. Apple gives them as much information as possible about how all the code was written, and often even tells them where potential threats might be, essentially giving them all the tools possible to break in to OSX, and every time within about 2 weeks there's an update that fixes those exploits. There are many things that make OSX secure, and many of them are sitting in the OS completely unused by most people because security has never been an issue for them. It's been proven by many different people many different times that the whole market share argument is completely bogus. To say that it's not worth going after the 10% of people who use macs is pretty ridiculous. If it were easy to get financial information off of those computers, don't you think that would be ridiculously lucrative for you? Hack Apple for crying out loud, they completely run on OSX internally, and they have many billions of dollars. If you wanted to be honest about it, figure out a way to do it, then sell the idea to Apple. They pay TONS of money for that kind of stuff. Anyway, it's just bogus that Windows is more secure than OSX.
That being said, I suppose there are always the "safe" modes that you can put windows in, which don't allow any incoming or outgoing communication without your express permission, and you have to give personal permission for the computer to do anything, but I'm talking about usable computers not the super-secure settings, which OSX also has if you want to turn that stuff on. Aren't we forgetting file vault too? If you're really concerned on OSX, turn on file vault and encrypt everything on your HD with your admin password. It's a pain, it slows things down a little bit, but then it doesn't matter who gets in to your computer, because the file vault encryption is quite hard to break.
Saying that OSX is hacked in minutes if not seconds at these hacking events is a little bit of a misleading statement. Apple gives them as much information as possible about how all the code was written, and often even tells them where potential threats might be, essentially giving them all the tools possible to break in to OSX, and every time within about 2 weeks there's an update that fixes those exploits. There are many things that make OSX secure, and many of them are sitting in the OS completely unused by most people because security has never been an issue for them. It's been proven by many different people many different times that the whole market share argument is completely bogus. To say that it's not worth going after the 10% of people who use macs is pretty ridiculous. If it were easy to get financial information off of those computers, don't you think that would be ridiculously lucrative for you? Hack Apple for crying out loud, they completely run on OSX internally, and they have many billions of dollars. If you wanted to be honest about it, figure out a way to do it, then sell the idea to Apple. They pay TONS of money for that kind of stuff. Anyway, it's just bogus that Windows is more secure than OSX.
That being said, I suppose there are always the "safe" modes that you can put windows in, which don't allow any incoming or outgoing communication without your express permission, and you have to give personal permission for the computer to do anything, but I'm talking about usable computers not the super-secure settings, which OSX also has if you want to turn that stuff on. Aren't we forgetting file vault too? If you're really concerned on OSX, turn on file vault and encrypt everything on your HD with your admin password. It's a pain, it slows things down a little bit, but then it doesn't matter who gets in to your computer, because the file vault encryption is quite hard to break.
More lucrative than 90%? You think the people smart enough to do these things are going to risk jail time by going after the smallest profit? Incase youve forgotten this stuff is highly illegal, they dont just do it because its fun.
Macmel I enjoyed your post and arguments very much, right up to the point you started quoting vulnerabilities without reference.
You claim that IIS has had no RCE vulnerabilities - so what is CVE-2009-3023 ? Its an RCE vulnerability from this year in the IIS FTP server component.
CVE-2008-0075 is another RCE, and since 2006 there have been 12 vulnerabilities in IIS and related components that are rated HIGH.
I saw no relevance going back more than three years, but I also have to say that I am trying to be even handed here.
Over the same period there have been 24 Apache vulnerabilities rated as HIGH. So I make that twice as many.
These are all ratifiable from: http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/search?execution=e2s1
You claim that IIS has had no RCE vulnerabilities - so what is CVE-2009-3023 ? Its an RCE vulnerability from this year in the IIS FTP server component.
CVE-2008-0075 is another RCE, and since 2006 there have been 12 vulnerabilities in IIS and related components that are rated HIGH.
I saw no relevance going back more than three years, but I also have to say that I am trying to be even handed here.
Over the same period there have been 24 Apache vulnerabilities rated as HIGH. So I make that twice as many.
These are all ratifiable from: http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/search?execution=e2s1
For the sake of clarity, my statement was to ensure the debate remained on the differences in software (specifically osx vs. windows) rather than any hardware differences, showing that a Mac and a PC are actually not that different from a hardware standpoint, or in other words, it is a level playing field.
Of course the code would need to be different. The OS is totally different. Its the whole point of the thread.
As it happens you could easily use automator to cause damage with little to no programming experience needed. Getting your script onto someones mac remotely and executing it is another story.
The tree and the dog analogy was actually more a facetious dig at a previous post detailing a biological comparison, rather than to prove a point (I hate analogies) however if you must glean some serious meaning from it:
Tree= Carbon based organic life-form
Dog= Carbon based organic life-form
(Shares 99% of their DNA (hardware) Not to confused with genes (software).
Virus= Affects only (but not all) organic carbon based life-forms. Gains entry through the respiratory system. (Affects dog but not tree)
It's not meant to be taken literally. Lets not turn this into a thread about silicon based nazi alien life forms please.
There are nearly a billion computers in the world... Even 1% of that is a lot of computers.
Because servers never get hacked
You sound like an expert, how many computers have you hacked into?
Why not when that is where the really valuable information is?
As for how many computers I've hacked into... That is none of your business. Lets just say I am employed in the IT industry and know what I'm doing with regards to security.
No OS is secure. Not a one. And to be fair if I were a hacker after a botnet I would probably target Macs... Why? because most Mac users do think themselves invulnerable, and therefore don't have the protection software that most Windows users are forced to run.
Thing is, real world hackers still target Windows. Not because it's the tallest nail. But because it is the easiest to attack. Despite all of the software that these people run.
Market share isn't the only factor that determine security vulnerability. At the end of teh day, we can say that if there is a vulnerability, someone will exploit it somehow. It really boils down to the effort involved to commit your flavor of crime. Macs may have a low market share, but during the Classic OS era, they got viruses and exploits despite a low market share. The architectural differences between Macs and PC's mean that hackers have to invest in additional resources for something that they perceive as little gain based on the motives of exploit writers.
Windows is a massive target - there's also lots of exploits. It boils down to one fact. Of a human builds and designed it - another one can break it. Nothing is 100% immune as long as it is out of the box and powered on.
Windows is a massive target - there's also lots of exploits. It boils down to one fact. Of a human builds and designed it - another one can break it. Nothing is 100% immune as long as it is out of the box and powered on.
..bingo..
also Macmel... holy cow that was a response... nicely done
and to those who pointed to filevault in OSX... Ive been thinking of turning this on, does it truly protect me from being hacked even when using wifi? and how much will it put a lag on the system?
It wasn't that I didn't understand the concept. I just don't believe that macs are less secure. OSX security (as mentioned earlier) is based upon the idea that the root user requires password authentication to do anything where as windows operates as the root user all the time.
Since we love analogies around here.
Both are guys in Basra.
Both have body Armour.
One permanently has his wang out.
Only on the Ultimate version of Vista or the Enterprise/Ultimate versions of 7. Home Premium doesn't have BitLocker.
I was being sarcastic, if you really are a security expert then youd know that servers get messed up constantly. If youve ever had to run websites youd likely have experienced that first hand. Finding a hole on a server is a great way to distribute your virus.
No OS is secure is correct, so as long as Windows has flaws why on earth would you want to make a botnet of Macs? Thats counterproductive. Even all those Mac users who think theyre invincible would still be millions less than the Windows users who dont know what theyre doing.
personally, i dont really care. I have nothing but my music collection, my emails, my music mixing software (and music projects), photos and 1 game (baldur's gate II) on my mac, and its all backed up regularly on a offline backup drive.
If a hacker wants to come and piss on my mac, bring it on. I don't care, just the inconvenience of reinstalling and recovering all my data and the possibility they may have my email password (oh no!).
Anyone with data that is considered important (like banks and other companies) will be built on the latest ibm UNIX machines with the latest version of AIX. This article is worth less than the server hard disc space it's using.
If a hacker wants to come and piss on my mac, bring it on. I don't care, just the inconvenience of reinstalling and recovering all my data and the possibility they may have my email password (oh no!).
Anyone with data that is considered important (like banks and other companies) will be built on the latest ibm UNIX machines with the latest version of AIX. This article is worth less than the server hard disc space it's using.
No OS is 100% secure.
Once you start comparing one OS to another OS you will find pros and cons for all of them, and you can't even say definitively that one is more secure or safer than another for everyone because it depends how it's being used, and everyone uses their computers differently.
So in the end both sides end up making huge generalisations based on their own experiences and what they personally regard as the best criteria for what makes something secure or not, even if that subjective opinion is based on as objective security research and data as possible.
The truth is that we all just have to guess and take a bit of a wild stab in the dark, because if we/Microsoft/Apple/etc could clearly identify every vulnerability, flaw, bug, etc well enough to know we'd covered everything then we/they could fix them all too!
Having said all that, I feel confident, though not complacent, that OS X is a safer environment for me personally to be using. For a few reasons:
- I know my way around OS X a lot better than I know it around Windows. If something funny was up on OS X I would both notice and be able to fix it far faster and more completely than on Windows. That isn't a comment on how Microsoft or Apple write their OS, just one on how well I know each of their products.
- IMHO, I look at how successful paid-for 3rd-party security products such as Anti-virus software are and it seems to me that they do much better on Windows. If mac users were, in real-world terms being bitten by viruses / intrusions into their systems etc then I think that would change.
- I don't really accept the security through obscurity argument as being so strong an influence as many. Sure, it almost certainly has a part to play that there is a much smaller target, with far fewer users, and that in industrial use OS X fares better in creative markets rather than more commercial/business/corporate ones where the money is (or.. er was! too topical or political? sorry...). But there were viruses on OS 9 and earlier, with similar market share. I can remember there were a few viruses for the Amiga way back, and only the infancy of the web compared to now probably stopped a lot of those spreading a lot more. Lots of different OSs have got viruses. Yet OS X seems very resilient against them. Either that, or there's a load of very very hidden attacks that know one knows of yet!
- Finally, though it might sounds like the security through obscurity argument again, I believe there is a subtle difference between that and the particular way in which Apple's OS has a smaller share (and this also applies for any Linux too). By that I mean that many, if not a majority of OS X users chose to use OS X over Windows. As an active decision. They not only knew the difference between OSs, they actively chose to use OS X over Windows, for whatever reason. This is quite different to at least some Windows users, who use Windows because... well, that's what computers use isn't it? Windows is the 'default' 'choice' by a huge number of people who got a Windows PC because they wanted a computer for a certain price, or their work bought them it, or they just didn't understand the options available to them, and have no real interest in learning it (and ideally there would be nothing wrong with that, and people shouldn't have to IMHO). And I'd wager that section of the average computer-buying public outnumbers all the mac owners (many of who made a conscious decision to opt for the non-default choice) on their own.
Once you start comparing one OS to another OS you will find pros and cons for all of them, and you can't even say definitively that one is more secure or safer than another for everyone because it depends how it's being used, and everyone uses their computers differently.
So in the end both sides end up making huge generalisations based on their own experiences and what they personally regard as the best criteria for what makes something secure or not, even if that subjective opinion is based on as objective security research and data as possible.
The truth is that we all just have to guess and take a bit of a wild stab in the dark, because if we/Microsoft/Apple/etc could clearly identify every vulnerability, flaw, bug, etc well enough to know we'd covered everything then we/they could fix them all too!
Having said all that, I feel confident, though not complacent, that OS X is a safer environment for me personally to be using. For a few reasons:
- I know my way around OS X a lot better than I know it around Windows. If something funny was up on OS X I would both notice and be able to fix it far faster and more completely than on Windows. That isn't a comment on how Microsoft or Apple write their OS, just one on how well I know each of their products.
- IMHO, I look at how successful paid-for 3rd-party security products such as Anti-virus software are and it seems to me that they do much better on Windows. If mac users were, in real-world terms being bitten by viruses / intrusions into their systems etc then I think that would change.
- I don't really accept the security through obscurity argument as being so strong an influence as many. Sure, it almost certainly has a part to play that there is a much smaller target, with far fewer users, and that in industrial use OS X fares better in creative markets rather than more commercial/business/corporate ones where the money is (or.. er was! too topical or political? sorry...). But there were viruses on OS 9 and earlier, with similar market share. I can remember there were a few viruses for the Amiga way back, and only the infancy of the web compared to now probably stopped a lot of those spreading a lot more. Lots of different OSs have got viruses. Yet OS X seems very resilient against them. Either that, or there's a load of very very hidden attacks that know one knows of yet!
- Finally, though it might sounds like the security through obscurity argument again, I believe there is a subtle difference between that and the particular way in which Apple's OS has a smaller share (and this also applies for any Linux too). By that I mean that many, if not a majority of OS X users chose to use OS X over Windows. As an active decision. They not only knew the difference between OSs, they actively chose to use OS X over Windows, for whatever reason. This is quite different to at least some Windows users, who use Windows because... well, that's what computers use isn't it? Windows is the 'default' 'choice' by a huge number of people who got a Windows PC because they wanted a computer for a certain price, or their work bought them it, or they just didn't understand the options available to them, and have no real interest in learning it (and ideally there would be nothing wrong with that, and people shouldn't have to IMHO). And I'd wager that section of the average computer-buying public outnumbers all the mac owners (many of who made a conscious decision to opt for the non-default choice) on their own.
Yes.
From the article.
"I still think you're pretty safe [on a Mac]," Miller said. "I wouldn't recommend antivirus on the Mac."
How long dya think it'd take to infect a windows machine on the net without antivirus software?
Still waiting for your proof.
*runs around in circles* Here I was, using Macs for 8 years, not realizing JUST HOW INSECURE THEY ARE!
OMG! *installs clamxav, that annoying ass firewall that pops up a dialog box every time a program tries to phone home, and all sorts of other watchdog crap*
OMG! *installs clamxav, that annoying ass firewall that pops up a dialog box every time a program tries to phone home, and all sorts of other watchdog crap*
Macs do have a file type comparable to .exe, they just don't have file extensions. A good first step is to look for binary files that are world executable. Wikipedia does an OK job of identifying different ways you can identify executables.
Filevault doesn't do anything against hacking. It just encrypts your home directory when you are not logged in. So if someone stole your laptop when it was shut down they couldn't get your encrypted files. If someone hacked into your system while you are logged in, your files are all unencrypted and easily copied or opened.