Good post but I don't agree with the whole "it's a question of who the virus writers target" competition.
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Originally Posted by fearlessfozz
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They always say, go get a mac or install linux. Well if everyone did then they will be the targets, and believe me they will take some heat. Sure right now Mac or linux may "seem" more secure just because of the freaking fact that they have, what 10% of the overall world market combined? Does that make them more secure? Or just less of a target? Is there substancial proof that Macs can't be hacked, or infected, or even linux?
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I certainly agree that it has SOME impact. But I don't think that it's the only reason. Far from it in fact.
There are no viruses for Mac OS X right now. None. Not 10. Not 5. Not even 1. There have been the occasional report from the virus companies but for some reason the virus never materializes. Scare tactic or misinterpretation perhaps. While it might be that the market share has an impact on this (and without a doubt it does) there are other reasons for that. The whole security architecture adopted by Apple is significantly different to that adopted by Microsoft. If I turn on my Mac and create my first user and put it on the network, it has no ports open and my user cannot install software without manually re-authenticating with the OS. It takes 3 seconds, but a re-authentication is still required. Let's say that I run a script of a website that exposes a weakness in my browser and tries to download and execute an application. The app cannot run without me letting it run, unless it's some incredibly benign app. These features help protect against both viruses and trojans. There is no real way to fully protect against trojans and the best way is with real time scanning (like an anti-virus app) since trojans rely on social engineering. But so far trojans have been a non-issue too. I put that down to more of a Market Share thing than the lack of viruses.
The OS is built as a secure architecture from the ground up. It's not an after thought. There are vulnerabilities, but nothing like what we see in XP. Bugs and vulnerabilities are there but they are much harder to take advantage of.
Dutch firm Secunia reported 52 security advisories for OS X since 2003. Of those 52, 31% are Less Critical or Not Critical while 27% are Highly Critical with 6% being Extremely Critical.
http://secunia.com/product/96/
They reported 85 advisories for XP Professional since 2003. Of the 85, 35% are Less Critical or Not Critical while 34% are Highly Critical with 1% being Extremely Critical.
http://secunia.com/product/22/
Interestingly, for XP, 25% of the 85 advisories are still unpatched.
For OS X only 2% of the 52 are unpatched.
The one outstanding security vulnerabilities for OS X is around creation of email accounts. It's deemed Not Critical.
For XP there are still several Highly Critical vulnerabilities that are exposed.
On the other side of the coin, the fact that Linux and OS X users live in this false world of safe attachments could well haunt them in the end. PCs may sit on the Internet and beg for infection, but at least they (by proxy) promote good safe computing habits. There are many carefree Mac and Linux users out there who could be in for a harsh reality check if your theory is correct. Or even if we agree that it's at least partially correct.
Although OS X is recent, it's built on a FreeBSD core. The technology that it lives and breathes on is not new and has been open to exploit for a long time.
There have been and always will be problems with security on the Mac platform. But as things stand today the problems are significantly less than on XP and that's driven by a much more robust architecture. And probably Market Share too. No doubt when/if the market share increases we'll see an increase in trojans and spyware. But hopefully not increase in viruses.
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