AV - What do you recommend?

cyko95cyko95
Posted:
in Mac Software edited January 2014
What does everyone recommend for Anti-Virus software? I just switched to Mac last month and have been going commando on the AV software. I want something that'll do the job, but not have a huge footprint in the OS. I use OS X of course, and would like it to do real time email scanning. Thanks all...

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 6
    snofsnof Posts: 98member
    I honestly don't have a recommendation, but also don't think that AV software is very necessary, I've been using a Mac for about 14 years and have never had a virus. All the viruses (virii?) out there tend to infect Windows only. I have received emails containing a virus but it has no effect on the Mac OS.
  • Reply 2 of 6
    ghost_user_nameghost_user_name Posts: 22,667member
    I'm in the same situation as Snof. I've used Macs since '84 and have only encountered one virus -- and it was a malignant one that literally did nothing unless it was executed on June 6th.



    You'll find that viruses are far less common on Macs than on Windows. In my opinion, the need to actively scan e-mail is really overkill. I have never seen an Mac virus transmitted through e-mail and even if there was one, it wouldn't have a way to execute itself like e-mail attachments can on Windows boxes. (Windows viruses, like any other Windows executable, do absolutely nothing on Mac systems.)



    In fact, I don't think OSX even has any documented viruses yet!



    [ 07-03-2002: Message edited by: starfleetX ]</p>
  • Reply 3 of 6
    cyko95cyko95 Posts: 391member
    I hope it stays that way. Unfortunately I think we may start seeing more viruses on computers of any OS since Java, and other upcoming languages, are cross-platform.
  • Reply 4 of 6
    snofsnof Posts: 98member
    [quote]Originally posted by cyko95:

    <strong>I hope it stays that way. Unfortunately I think we may start seeing more viruses on computers of any OS since Java, and other upcoming languages, are cross-platform.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    Java was specifically designed to have very little access to the system for just that reason (at least that's what I've heard).
  • Reply 5 of 6
    brianmacosbrianmacos Posts: 548member
    I just switched to Mac along with a ton of other people and I am sure that number is growing every day, if the Mac user base keeps getting bigger then we will probably see viruses but for now I feel safe but I do run Norton AV on my MacOSX and I don't even notice it on my system.
  • Reply 6 of 6
    neutrino23neutrino23 Posts: 1,562member
    Things could change but for now the Mac is relatively safe. Apart from the fact that few people write viruses for the Mac Apple ships the Mac with defaults set in the "safe" position. MS seems to ship things with defaults set in the "dangerous" position. Simply receiving an email attachment is not dangerous unless there is some way for that attachment to automatically execute.



    So far we have two levels of safety. First, almost no one sends you code that can execute on your Mac. Second, on most Macs the email program doesn't try to auto-execute the attachment.
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