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Mac Viruses By The Numbers - Word Macro: 553, Classic Mac: 26, OS X: Zero
by , 11:00 AM EDT, August 29th, 2003
So, another week, another Windows virus. Ho-hum.
Computer viruses--Windows-based computer viruses, for the most part--have been around for a long time now, but it's really only since the explosion of the Internet (the modern, commercialized Internet, that is) that they've caught the public eye, and it's only within the past 2-3 years (since the first "rock star" viruses, Melissa, AnnaKournikova and ILOVEYOU) that the media has made a fuss over it.
My, how times have changed. Today, nary a week goes by without headlines screaming about the latest Critical Security Flaw or Yet Another Doomsday Virus swarming the planet. Though Linux and even OS X have been known to have their own occasional security bugaboos, the vast majority of these warnings/threats have come straight out of Redmond (or, more to the point, straight out of sources that Big Redmond would prefer keep their mouths shut).
The past couple of weeks has brought the whole Virus Scare to a near-boiling point: the one-two punches of Blaster and SoBig seem to have FINALLY forced a few IT types to start questioning the whole Microsoft Is God And There Is No God Before Microsoft mantra. Some of the über geek types have started to look into alternate platforms and possibilities (this is particularly impressive since many of them didn't seem to be aware that there WERE any alternatives). Over at the Baltimore Sun, David Zeiler has written two columns exploring the long-standing debate over exactly why Macs are so seemingly immune to the numerous cyber-nasties flying around...is the operating system inherently harder to crack, or is it simply due to there being so many more Windows users out there than Mac users, or "Security Through Obscurity," as the saying goes?
Every time a new Windows virus hits the news (and the PCs), Mac users smugly go about their business and crow about how there's "hardly any" viruses for the Mac as opposed to the "thousands" of Windows-based viruses...but are often at a loss to pinpoint the exact evidence to support their claims. Supposedly, "everyone knows" that Macs have fewer viruses, but just how few has always been a bit of a mystery. In light of this, I decided to run a quick check on the exact numbers involved.
My source? Network Associates (NA), sellers of the McAfee and Virex antivirus products, and one of the leading names in computer virus/anti-virus/security software alongside Symantec and the oft-quoted Sophos PLC.
I kept my search fairly simple--this is just idle curiosity, not a paid research project, after all--but as logical as I could:
1. I went to NA's Virus Information Library
2. According to this site, "More than 71,000 virus threats exist today. The McAfee AVERT Virus Information Library has detailed information on where viruses come from, how they infect your system, and how to remove them."
OK, fair enough. I'm not going to look up all 71,000, but that's pretty specific...I'll take their word for it.
3. Next, I ran an advanced search using simply "Macintosh" as my criteria.
This kicked back a total of 612 virus listings.
4. Next, I subtracted out a couple dozen "Hoaxes"...hoaxes are not viruses, these are exactly what the name implies--phantom "chain-mail" style myths which perpetually circle the globe like the Flying Dutchman or the Wandering Jew, never settling down due to shmoes who keep forwarding them to their family & friends (with the best of intentions and the most annoying of results). Hoaxes are basically unintentional spam mail--annoying but not really dangerous, and there's so much actual spam out there nowadays that they've pretty much been buried by it. This brings the total down to 580.
5. I also deleted one which got listed only because the description stated that the virus does NOT affect Macintosh systems...the Boolean search threw it into the mix. Total: 579.
Before we go any further, note that we're already down to less than 1% of the total...even though Macs make up about 5% of the total INSTALLED BASE of computers worldwide (this is how many are IN USE, NOT how many are being sold each quarter/year, which is what "market share" means), depending on your source.
6. This is where things start to get very interesting. You see, out of those 579 total viruses which affect some versions of the Mac operating system, you'll notice that the vast majority of their names start with a WM/ or XM/. I checked these out, and sure enough, this means that they're a Macro virus which runs exclusively on some versions of--you guessed it--Microsoft Word or Microsoft Excel (there are a few Word/Excel Macro viruses which don't have WM/ or XM/ in their names as well). In fact, over 95% of these so-called "Mac" viruses are actually directly made possible by Microsoft software. If you take these out of the equation, which seems reasonable to me since there are solid alternatives on the Mac to Word and Excel, just as there are alternatives to Windows itself, you're left with the following number of viruses that affect the Mac and can't be blamed on Microsoft in any way, shape or form: 26.
Yes, that’s right: 26 out of a total of over 71,000.
However, I've left out one of the most important factors here: All 26 of these, along with the other 553 Word/Excel Macro viruses, were designed for the OLDER versions of the Mac OS (and the older versions of Word/Excel, to be fair). None of this has anything to do with Mac OS X, which is the relevant system to look at.
If you remove the viruses which don't affect OS X, you know what you're left with--at least, as of this writing, and to the best of my knowledge?
Zero. None. Zip. Zilch.
A few final notes:
--Yes, Apple has had the occasional security issue update for OS X, but a security issue isn't the same thing as a virus--it's a potential, theoretical threat. Besides, any time Apple has released a security update, it's been a quick, quiet, simple install with no muss, no fuss, and no worsening of the original problem (again, to my knowledge).
--Yes, it can also be argued that just as the majority of Mac viruses can't be counted against OS X, so too the majority of Windows viruses may very well not affect Windows XP. To this I have two responses: 1) if you feel like digging into each and every one of those 70,974 virus descriptions to see which versions of Windows they do or don't affect, be my guest, because I don't have THAT much free time; and 2) even assuming that 90% of them don't affect XP, that would still leave a ratio of 7,100 to 0...and 7,100 is still infinitely more than none.
--Getting back to the original question of why there are so few viruses for the Mac, my response is simple: Does it really matter? Let's assume that the naysayers are correct, that the only reason is because "no one bothers" to crack into the Mac OS. Even if this is the case (which I doubt)...SO WHAT? If I live in a neighborhood with an extremely low crime rate, I really don't care WHY the burglars stay away. Maybe I have good locks on my doors. Maybe they don't like the stuff in my house. Bottom line, Ill still sleep better at night.
--Finally, yes, there's always the possibility of a nasty OS X virus someday--that's why Apple includes Virex with their .Mac accounts, and that's why the company issues the occasional security update. OS X is not 100% immune to nasty problems (as anyone who lost their hard drive during the iTunes 2 debacle can tell you). No operating system is.
Also, the argument keeps being made by some anti-Mac partizans that "if Macs had 90% of the market, they'd have just as many virus problems as Windows does," as if this justifies Microsoft's sloppy coding. Well, you know what? Maybe that's true; I doubt it, but perhaps it is. The day that Apple has a 90% market share and is plagued with viruses, I'll be more than happy to admit that I was wrong.
Somehow, I don't see either of those things happening anytime soon, but I can wait if you can.
Observer Comments
Tue Nov 08, 2005 1:37 pm Subject: Helpful advice. not.
As much as the advice given here is helpful:
http://www.getsafeonline.org/nqcontent.cfm?a_id=1165
It bugs me when they say things like
"Get anti-virus software
Because Mac OS X is based on the Unix operating system it is much less susceptible to viruses and other threats than other operating systems. However, that doesn’t mean that there are no Mac viruses. Consequently, it is worth considering the purchase of an anti-virus program."
"doesn't mean there are no Mac viruses"? (Remember the article is specific to Tiger)
There are NO mac viruses, so why oh why do they have to give such stupid advice? Recommending people spend money on something that protects against nothing is bad advice and could do more harm than good.
I think it's pretty much covered well here:
http://www.macfixitforums.com/php/showflat.php?Board=Forum8&Number=713778
Good thing you posted Guest, please name ONE of the virus that you are removing on a weekly basis from your macs, and please set up a link to any credible anti virus source or company who knows about it. I ask out of concern because I have 3 macs, one of them since 98, one since 2000 and the other since 2001 and have never had one virus in any of them. They are my work horses and are up and running about 14 hours a day. I might be living in an alternate world where macs are safe and stable and I dont want to have my bubble burst. Or maybe it's the fact that I live in Mexico, and virus don't come this far... or they can't handle the spicy food... perhaps third world is not suited for mac virus...or I could be dreaming all of this... perhaps I took the blue pill... or...
Tue Jan 03, 2006 9:39 pm Subject: Re: No Mac Virus??
QuoteAnonymous wrote:
I have approx 60 MAC systems doing research and remove at least one virus per week even though we have Virus protection and a hardware firewall.
Three possibilities:
a: you are a liar
b: they're all running Virtual PC and they're all Windows viruses
c: you have discovered viruses which no-one else in the world has found.
I go with possibility a until proved otherwise.
Sat Jan 28, 2006 1:59 pm Subject:
Do you mean a blue bubble? because there's no Finder icon as such.
If it is, getting rid of it is easy:
Open Terminal (/Application/Utilities/Terminal) and type in the following:
Code
defaults write com.apple.dock wvous-floater -bool false
killall Dock
You don't have a virus. This is something that Apple put into the OS in Panther(?) and it's still there. I don't believe either Apple or anyone else has found a particular use for it.
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