The latest Mac “threat”

October 25, 2004 · Comments

So now there’s something else for Mac users to supposedly worry about. It’s known as “Opener” and rather than take a lame, probably-wrong try at explaining it I’m just going to link to the site where I first read about it. There, it’s linked.

I’m also not going to bother speculating as to whether it’s serious or not. I think DB does a pretty good job of taking a bird’s eye view of the situation. What I find hysterical is the way the “mainstream” media trips over themselves to circle the wagons. Like this story on C’NET, which makes it sound like a widespread issue. In fact, no one has actually been victim to Opener and what is the source of the article? The original Macintouch report referenced above. FWIW, I agree with DB. I think Mac users are a little too quick to pat themselves on the back when it comes to security. There is a difference between being comfortable, and being complacent. I don’t have virus protection installed on my Mac(s). It’s not because I’m cocky, or I think my Mac is immune. It’s because I haven’t found a Mac anti-virus software package yet where the benefits of the so-called security are worth the hit on performance and stability that come with it. They make a big show of scanning your drive for all these threats. The number known to be Mac-specific and spread within the last 10 years can be counted on one hand and even those aren’t easily transmitted. Most outddated, most only impact Windows. As soon as the threat outweighs the inconvenience and maintenance hassle, I’ll be first in line to buy the software.

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