Protect Yourself From Computer Viruses – Switch to Mac

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I love Walter Mossberg. In today’s Wall St. Journal he writes, under How to Protect Yourself From Vandals, Viruses If You Use Windows that

The single most effective way to avoid viruses and spyware is to simply chuck Windows altogether and buy an Apple Macintosh. Apple’s operating system, Mac OS X, is harder for the criminals to infect, and the Mac’s market share is so small that hackers, virus writers and spies get little thrill, financial gain or publicity from attacking the platform.

There has never been a successful virus written for Mac OS X, and there is almost no spyware that targets the Mac. Plus, the Mac is invulnerable to viruses and spyware written for Windows. Not only is it more secure, but the Mac operating system is more capable, more modern and more attractive than Windows XP, and just as stable.

Macs are as good as, and often better than, Windows PCs at doing the most common computing tasks: Web browsing, e-mail, word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, photos, music and video. The Mac version of Microsoft Office can handle Windows Office files with ease, and it produces files that Office for Windows handles effortlessly. Apple’s computers are also gorgeous.

Yes! Tell it like it is Walt!

It has always amazed me the degree to which people value conformity over brilliance, beauty, and quality. The reason an investment banking MBA friend of mine told me he used a PC was that 90% of the world couldn’t be wrong (this was a while ago). Hello? Lemmings. You’re all lemmings. Get a Mac and start enjoying your computer instead of screaming at it.

7 thoughts on “Protect Yourself From Computer Viruses – Switch to Mac”

  1. So what if I cannot switch to Mac computers? I’m forced to work on my brainless Windows PC and I want to protect my system from intruders and viruses. What do I need to do?

  3. um… aren’t we forgetting linux. mandrake is gorgeous too and nearly invulnerable to spyware and viruses and it costs a fraction of the cost of windows or mac.

  4. LOL! Too funny. People get so upset about their favorite operating systems!

    Windows is the de facto king; if you want to share files in the real world, you run Windows. Period. Macs are faster, adorable, easy to use, and capable. Boxes running Linux are safe and have that wonderful geeky cachet (not to mention the sheer satisfaction conferred when you just get the damn thing /working/ after weeks of tweaking and searching for drivers for that cheap or obscure sound or video card your dad gave you).

    Macs have always boasted higher res and faster processors, and they’ve always been virus safe. But. They didn’t have any built-in network troubleshooting tools (hello! PING?!!?! how can anyone live five seconds without network diagnostic tools?!?)) until OSX came out.

    (And OSX is based on Unix, not the original Apple kernel. If that tells you anything.)

    I own PCs because they’re cheaper than Macs, and I run Windows because it’s /way/ easier to actually setup and use than *nix. (Ever tried to install Linux on a laptop? OMG, what a lesson in tediousness.)

    If you really do value safety, then buying a Mac truly is The Way To Go. Especially for the low-tech. But if being virus-free isn’t as important as all that, then keep Windows and get yourself virus protection (like AVG) and a firewall (like ZoneAlarm) and a non-sucky browser (like Firefox) and don’t open crap when you don’t know what it is.

    …I will never, ever forgive Apple for discontinuing the Newton, though. That was the most amazing little thing EVER. Seriously. Dude.

  5. Well, there is a factor that you’re not considering, Elise: choice. If I want a notebook/laptop computer, there is far less choice in form factor, performance, etc. in the Mac world than in the Windows world.

  6. Thank you for saying that. I use a macintosh and I love it to death. That is the bottom line. I hate my windows computer because its got all that spyware on it. Bleh!

  7. I love it, funny thing was before my blog server crashed and I had rebuilt it, I wrote almost the same article on my blog.
    I like to here all this high tech low tech stuff, arguments about networking….
    They used to say Windows users did things TO their computers while mac users did things WITH their computer. I liked the idea of it but it wasn’t always true.
    Mac used UNIX as its base because it hoped to pull in many present day UNIX users to its platform
    Security is low on windows because it is an operating system constantly under siege.
    It is the same whereever you look people choose a particular make or product as a standard, even if it is not always the best….e.g. in the UK many often say I will do some hoovering instead of vacuuming..me I have a SEBO, but that is another arugument.
    Others may have had the best machines and software but microsoft had the best connections and the best PR.