Apple Quietly Pulls Claims of Virus Immunity

It's still useful to have though, and Apple makes it really easy to install. GlimmerBlocker, Maple, Processing and a few game clients I use need it. It does seem that the default is that "Enable applet plug-in and Web Start applications" is off by default (in the Java Preferences app; there's no mention in System Preferences).

"Let's hope more Apple Mac owners are also learning to take important security steps -- such as installing antivirus protection."

This is the worst possible step to take.

When I switch someone over to Mac I take the opportunity to recalibrate how they see their computer as secure. I teach them to be more aware of what they are doing and how potential viruses could infect them. I find this is 100x more effective than installing antivirus software which is shit most of the time and instills a fake sense of security.

I had a family member who would always click "OK" whenever a window popped up in Windows or would blindly enter in their password because they figured Windows was just annoying them. When they got their Mac I taught them that whenever OS X opened up a window asking for their password or asked them if they really wanted to open up a file, they should freak the hell out and be 100% sure of why that box appeared. I actually got a couple of phone calls from them asking if certain popups were OK. Sure this was annoying at first but after a week or two they started to understand why these things were happening.

The great benefit of changing their way of thinking and making security a priority was that when Flashback hit I told them that disabling plugins was one of the best ways to prevent from being infected and they immediately accepted this.

Macs are not 100% secure. No one should be under any delusions of this. But teaching people why they are not secure is the solution. Not hiding behind POS antivirus software.

Well, they must be doing something right at Cupertino, because they really don't get viruses. Not theoretically of future-wise: practically.

99.9% of things reported (and even those are not that many to begin with) are trojans. So, Mac viruses are like the Yeti, they might well exist, but very few people have seen them in real life.

It's not just market share either. OS8/9 had several viruses with 1/5 the market share OS X has now.

If one considers that OS X is basically NeXTStep, and essentially a UNIX, do one really sees many viruses in UNIX systems? What I'm getting at is that the "administrator privileges by default", "can fuck with any file on the system" feature of Windows --up to Windows XP, which is where viruses really reigned, was not part of OS X from the beginning.

So, at worst, OS X since 10.0 was as secure as Windows Vista, which was not a swiss cheese OS like, say, Windows 98. Plus, OS X didn't have Active X, either, and used a custom PDF viewing (Acrobat is another common attack vector in Wintels).

Now, with the eviction of Flash and Java plugins as the default, and several other techniques (sandboxing, ASLR, signatures, etc), things will get even better.

"PC" has been appropriated numerous times by vendors to mean a specific platform. In the times were personal computers were less-standardised "IBM PC" and later "PC Clones" referred to the platform and not "personal computer" specifically. This naturally led to Macintosh computer being referred to as Macs, even though they too are "personal computers".

The problem is that many people today don't understand the history of personal computing and that "PC" has an established history of meaning a specific mainstream platform. I think some mistakenly poke fun at Apple, as if they had invented the label 'PC' for their ad campaign. When actually Apple merely took advantage of this convenient, existing differentiator for their PC vs Mac ads.

Apple have been working references to other platforms out of their marketing materials for years. Comparisons are no longer needed when a company has found their publicly-held niche.

Great solution. This is the right attitude toward security in any case, Mac or PC. You can't neglect safe driving just because your car has air bags, yet I see that exact problem on computers with anti-virus all the time.

Macs actually do make it easier because they have a pretty good track record of not "crying wolf" with things such as password prompts or security warnings. Most of the pop-ups are justified and infrequent.

Macs have never been 100% secure. No computer is. Apple pulling this marketing has nothing to do with a reduction in security and everything to do with covering their legal butts as their platform becomes more popular and more targeted. It's still the user's responsibility to keep themselves safe in the end, even with a decently secure OS.