How common is for a mac to..

[Sdahe]

... get a virus?

Yes... I usually use my mac browsing the web and in forums. I don't open suspicious emails or attachments from anybody. Can someone install a cookie in the browser and hack my computer?.. I'm a little paranoid with this.

Thanks

 

[Eidorian]

I suggest you search the forums first about viruses.

As for cookies, privacy might be a greater concern.

 

[dukebound85]

macs dont get viruses .

with that said dont randomly ok to install programs from iffy places. you could possibly run into trouble there

 

[Sdahe]

Maybe I can find if there is anything strange in the activity window... where you can see all the process that are running

 

[phungy]

Search for "virus" on Apple.com

 

[Sdahe]

Here is a list of all the process running in my computer right now... anything strange?

Active Memory: 367.00 MB
Free Memory: 1.47 GB
Wired Memory: 130.78 MB
Used Memory: 532.02 MB
Inactive Memory: 34.24 MB
Total VM: 29.92 GB
Number of processes: 44

0 kernel_task
1 launchd
10 kextd
11 notifyd
12 syslogd
14 ntpd
16 update
19 securityd
21 mds
22 mDNSResponder _mdnsrespo
23 loginwindow
24 KernelEventAgent
26 hidd
27 fseventsd
28 dynamic_pager
30 diskarbitrationd
31 DirectoryService
33 configd
36 autofsd
37 socketfilterfw
39 coreservicesd
41 distnoted
47 blued
49 WindowServer
58 mdworker
61 launchd
66 mdworker
73 coreaudiod
80 Spotlight
81 UserEventAgent
82 Dock
83 SystemUIServer
84 ATSServer
85 Finder
86 pboard
92 iTunes Helper
93 Microsoft AU Daemon
94 usbmuxd
101 Firefox
146 Activity Monitor
147 pmTool
156 DashboardClient
157 DashboardClient
158 SyncServer

Where can I shut off the some of this process?

 

[Eidorian]

There's nothing strange there.

You can kill processes from Activity Monitor but I'm a fan via the command line.

 

[vansouza]

... get a virus?

Yes... I usually use my mac browsing the web and in forums. I don't open suspicious emails or attachments from anybody. Can someone install a cookie in the browser and hack my computer?.. I'm a little paranoid with this.

Thanks

As if this writing, Macs do not get viruses; we can however pass infected email that we get from windows users back to windows users. You can read about Unix viruses here: http://www.clamav.net/

 

[Sdahe]

There's nothing strange there.

You can kill processes from Activity Monitor but I'm a fan via the command line.

If I kill itunes helper from the Activity Monitor... it won't run again when I restart the computer?

 

[Eidorian]

If I kill itunes helper from the Activity Monitor... it won't run again when I restart the computer?

You can kill nearly any process and OS X will either restart it or you can just start it again yourself.

Don't try it on kernel_task, please....

 

[Me1000]

macs dont get viruses .

Not true, "There are no viruses for the Mac" would be a more accurate statement!
Macs could certainly get a virus, to say they cant is inaccurate. There are potential security vulnerabilities in all software. They may be hard to find, but to say they are nonexistence is ridiculous.

 

[Sdahe]

Not true, "There are no viruses for the Mac" would be a more accurate statement!
Macs could certainly get a virus, to say they cant is inaccurate. There are potential security vulnerabilities in all software. They may be hard to find, but to say they are nonexistence is ridiculous.

So there are virus for Mac s

 

[JNB]

So there are virus for Mac s

There are currently no Mac viruses in the wild. The only thing that popped up in the last year was a trojan, and there was no malicious payload, anyway. I have NEVER been infected using a Mac, totally unprotected. Not to say that some day there may be legitimate worries, but for now, don't sweat it.

 

[unity]

I had plenty of Mac viruses, but WAY back in the 90s with system 6 and 7. Some were not like a virus today, they were a virus in the true sense. Created by bad code, etc. CDEF, T4-C, etc.

Anyway, those are so outdated there wont even harm OS 8, 9 or 10.

And to say that "one day there could be...", that may be true but has been said for the past 6 years or more.

As of right now, there is nothing, you are fine, dont panic!

 

[Sdahe]

Hey guys... thank you very much for those opinions. I feel better now

 

[apfhex]

Not true, "There are no viruses for the Mac" would be a more accurate statement!

Well, it's more like "Macs don't get viruses" because "there are no viruses for the Mac". 😉 I don't think anyone said "can't" — still a good idea to keep up safe web habits for the day one finally shows up (seems inevitable, but we're still waiting...).

 

[Aranince]

If you think virus/spyware cannot effect OSX....your sadly misled. With all these new Mac customers...hackers are bound to point their nose at OSX.

 

[juanster]

If you think virus/spyware cannot effect OSX....your sadly misled. With all these new Mac customers...hackers are bound to point their nose at OSX.

i am pretty sure MS spends thousands of dollars a year researching osx viruses the same way i am sure apple spends thousands of dollars a year creating pc viruses...

 

[TheStu]

If you think virus/spyware cannot effect OSX....your sadly misled. With all these new Mac customers...hackers are bound to point their nose at OSX.

And yet... the best we have so far is a trojan that requires the end user to be so stupid, they might as well not be breathing.

The security through obscurity argument has been tried, time and time again, and has been debunked, time and time again. The fact that Apple is gaining market share is not going to affect the landscape significantly when it comes to viruses/trojans/spyware/et al. on OS X.

 

[Sdahe]

There are a lot of people changing to mac but still not enough for hackers change their minds to attack mac. The computer industry is running in windows platform and that's what hackers like... WINDOWS...

🙂

 

[psonice]

Many hackers use OSX themselves. I think the lack of viruses etc. is just down to profit - there's much more money to be made from windows. That's started to change though, which is why we now have a few trojans out in the wild.

Realistically, turn on the firewall, be careful opening email attachments and stop visiting dodgy websites, and you should be ok. At the moment you only need to worry about having something nasty if you've been visiting porn sites, were asked to install some software to get free porn, installed it and gave it your password.

And I recommend not quitting processes unless either you know what you're doing, or you have a really good reason to do it 😉

 

[CavemanUK]

My personal feelings are that the guys who think that OSX hasnt had problems with virus because OSX isnt big enough are being a little naive.

The Morons that create viruses do for for a number of reasons...

1) To prove their Skillz
2) To reveal a security flaw
3) For Fun
4) To get some kind of job in security

..and numerous other reasons...

For a long time now OSX has touted itself as secure. "No Viruses" shout Apple. This alone would be enough to make Virus Authors sit up and take notice. The l33t credit they would get from breaking open OSX would have them permanently erect for weeks!

Secondly, Last I read, Apple now have an approx 7% market share. Thats MILLIONS of computers and if there were 100,000+ virus for windows.. surely we should have at least 1 or 2 serious threats!

Thirdly, A hacker or virus author is generally going to be a tech-savvy kind of person. You cant tell me they dont look at Apple computers. You cant tell me none of them OWN an apple computer and being tech-savvy, you cant tell me that they dont know the system very well.

If A virus came out that truly broke into OSX (rather than that silly codec incident) it would be world-wide tech news.. the guy would become famous in his field.

For these reasons and others, im very confident that overall, OSX is a very secure system.. Of course I dont think its impregnable. Far from it.. but up to now its proven itself as very secure.

 

[psonice]

The Morons that create viruses do for for a number of reasons...

1) To prove their Skillz
2) To reveal a security flaw
3) For Fun
4) To get some kind of job in security

..and numerous other reasons...

A few years back that would have been true. Now, it's mostly the security researchers that do it for those reasons, while the 'serious' bad guys do it for profit. That's why there are no massive virus outbreaks any more - everything is kept small scale, and quiet - that way it can infect a smaller but well targeted number of computers, and stay hidden from the anti-virus makers and out of the news. The most common 'damage' done these days is stealing bank details, sending out spam, identity theft, creating fake ebay auctions etc.

The only really threatening mac malware is the porn site trojan, and once that's installed you never hear or see it - it just redirects your browser from a banking site to a dodgy hacker controlled site, where your account name and password are stolen.

That's why the 'security through obscurity' thing is actually true - it's much easier to make money from windows machines, because there's a bigger range of targets to attack, and more of the people you'd want to attack use windows. Some of the worst attacks recently have been very specific targets against fairly small numbers of businessmen, where the attack is crafted just for them, and a lot of money gets taken. How many company execs sit at a mac all day?