mcAfee stick-up

[Cataboo]

+1 on switching to MAC - we don't need no stinkin' virus protection .

I am so going to laugh when the mac market share gets large enough that people start writing viruses for mac's... and everyone that thought they were safe and didn't take any precautions because they have a mac get viruses.

But I'm mean that way.

[tzvia]

There aren't many (compared to PC) viruses for the MAC, but they are out there, from OSX/Leap-A to Newton and iBotnet and maybe 60(??) others, but you only need to get one to have a bad hair day. And from what I hear, the MAC ones are nasty.

I would only run a computer (any kind) without AV software if 3 things can be 100% assured.
1. No new software is to be installed or data copied from floppy/cd/external drive/memory card and no provision for such access is installed.
2. No internet connection and no provision for one (no RJ45, USB slot, 1394, wireless or RJ11).
3. Computer is physically secured. No unauthorized users.

I clean viruses (among other things) for a living in aerospace so I am not without experience here and my take is, if it can receive data from another computer, in any form, it needs AV software.

For the PC, I agree with TsPoet; Avast is quite impressive for 'Free for home use' software, and I wish we used it at work. I was not impressed with AVG when I tried it years ago, and Mcafee is a bit of a resource hog and is hard to remove.

[VeloVT]

Anybody have recommendations for a good AV program for mac? I've been running mine for a few years without, but I realize that, as Tzvia points out, it's taking a risk. There aren't as many AV programs out there for mac and no one seems to take many of the ones that are available very seriously.

[GLC1968]

liza - my husband (in the business) has heard that iantivirus is supposed to be good but apparently it only works on an Intel based Mac. Not sure if that helps you at all, but I figured I'd throw it out there.

[witeowl]

I am so going to laugh when the mac market share gets large enough that people start writing viruses for mac's... and everyone that thought they were safe and didn't take any precautions because they have a mac get viruses.

But I'm mean that way.

But I'm soooo with you! But only for the smug mac owners. There are mac owners who realize that it's only because they're not common enough to be the target audience (yet). It's not that macs are any more secure than pc; they're just not being targeted by the virus creators.

So I'm with you, but only for the people that don't get it.