Do You Need Antivirus Software on the Mac?

Thursday, May 06 2010

By: chrisb

Computer viruses are a fact of life in the PC world and from time to time especially bad viruses make the news. No PC user who wants to keep their computer intact goes without some kind of virus protection.

As a result, I am often asked (especially from Switchers) about virus protection on the Mac. Is it something that Mac users need as well?

The short answer is "probably not." For a longer answer, below are excerpt from an article in TidBITS, a news source for Mac users. The article is from 2008, but the info it contains remains current today.

There is a misperception among much of the security community that Mac users don't care about security. Since joining TidBITS I've learned that Mac users are just as concerned about their security as their Windows brethren, but they aren't really sure what they need to know.

The reality is that today the Mac platform is relatively safe. Hundreds of thousands of viruses and other malicious software programs are floating around for Windows, but less than 200 are known to target the Mac, and many of those are aimed at versions of the Mac OS prior to Mac OS X (and thus have no effect on a modern Mac).

Desktop antivirus software is also only a limited defense, and one that's typically very resource intensive. By even the most positive assessments, antivirus software catches only 85 to 95 percent of known malicious software (viruses, worms, trojans, and other nasty stuff) in the wild. This leaves a significant level of exposure, especially considering you're running software that brings your system to its knees whenever you have a full scan scheduled. Antivirus tools are intrusive by nature, don't offer nearly the security they advertise, and can be costly to maintain over time.

In short, at this point in time, I don't recommend desktop antivirus for the average Mac user. You only need to deploy it if you engage in risky behavior, need to protect friends on Windows, or comply with corporate policies. It's quite probable this will change in time, so it makes sense to take some reasonable precautions today and stay aware of the world around you. Better yet, let's continue to pressure Apple for stronger security so we can completely avoid resource leaching desktop antivirus in the long term.

To learn what defines "risky behavior" and far more, read the entire article at TidBITS.