Antivirus for Mac

[Magnus]

There's been some information lately saying that users of Symantec's Norton Antivirus for Mac OS X make themselves less secure by using the software. I don't think anyone would blame you for assuming that using an antivirus software would make you more secure, but perhaps that's not the case.

I've been a Mac user a long time and I remember the pre-OS X days as far back as System 6, and the era of Disinfectant by John Norstad. Disinfectant was for a long time the reigning king of Mac antivirus but it retired in 1998. Back then there was actually a problem with viruses on Macs and I used to get them regularly, usually through infected floppies. I've never been a big fan of Symantec products anyway, but there's little choice when it comes to antivirus products for Mac, or so I thought. What if you don't want to put Norton AV on your precious Mac, what can you do? Some say that you don't need any antivirus on a Mac because there are no Mac OS X specific viruses. That's true but there will be sooner or later and by having antivirus software installed you can at least make sure you don't pass any nasty stuff on to your Windows using friends and colleagues. There's Intego's Virusbarrier, which some users say is a really good product, so have a look at that if you want to. Personally, I would stay away from Norton AV. I guess the other alternative is Virex, now by McAfee. I was never a fan of that product either and lately it's been just sorely neglected.

So is it all bad news then? No, you're in luck because there's a good (and free) alternative on Mac and it's ClamXAV which is based on the widely-uses open source ClamAV. I've only used it for a little bit and it certainly hasn't the polished look of Norton AV and I don't think it has a resident component (although I may be wrong) but it's darn good, folks. Give it a try, why don't you?