Google's Eric Schmidt: If you care about security, get a Mac, not a PC | Hacker News Reader

Google's Eric Schmidt: If you care about security, get a Mac, not a PC

thenextweb.com

18 pointshamedh9 comments

Yes, Windows has many more exposed security risks. Mac's have around an 8-9% market reach right now. As Apple's market share raises you'll see more and more viruses targeted at Mac's as we have in the last couple of weeks. Let's see what happens if Apple ever is able to get 25%+ of the market using Mac's.

In 16 years of using Windows with no Anti-Virus software installed, I have never gotten a virus. Maybe Microsoft should do a better job of educating users on what not to click on.

I run a company that does IT Support for businesses. Once a week or so, I'll have a CEO bring in his kids Laptop with a virus and a good number of times it was caused by their kid using some p2p file sharing program and downloading and running cracked versions of software which contained the virus. This is not yet as big of a problem for Apple as the number of software titles in general is much smaller and thus people downloading cracked copies which might contain a virus is going to be smaller.

Two cents.

What about a firewall? Because I have seen Windows machines infected through no fault of their users within your 16-year period (Blaster being the most triumphant example). Admittedly this is probably a minority of malware installs out there, but I think it gives Microsoft a little too much credit and their users not quite enough to suggest that it's 100% caused by them clicking on ILoveYou.jpg.exe.

Lets correct one sentence. In 16 years of using windows with no anti-virus, you have never gotten a virus that you were aware of.

Would you rather go to a place which has no defenses because they never got hit or to a place which is constantly improving their security?

The recent mac defender showed how simple it is to social engineer mac users because they think its secure.

If you are worried about security , don't do stupid stuff

Eric Schmidt is giving poor advice in an area that is far outside of his expertise. I would be surprised if he even knows what DEP and ASLR are.

You don't need to know what either of those things are to make the (correct) observation that the majority of malware targets the systems on which it'll get the most bang for its buck.

At least currently, that means targeting Windows users - solely because there are so many more of them than Apple users.

Of course we should all use Chrome. That way, Google can keep tabs on us! Seriously, more bad advice that plays on Apple's security through obscurity.

I wonder what his advice is for people that care about privacy. All indications so far have been: don't worry about it.

In my personal spectrum of concerns, having my machine occasionally violated by a virus is not nearly as disturbing as full multi year search and browsing histories being stored and shared without my permission or online profiles being consolidated into a single identity. I'm not saying that google does all this - but it's a lot more scary than a virus.

>I wonder what his advice is for people that care about privacy. All indications so far have been: don't worry about it.

I read most of these cases were intended to be jokes.

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