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by EGreg 3291 days ago
Anecdotally, I have never had a virus on Mac (that I detected) and neither did any friends, but Windows got infected all the time. This was true going back to Windows 95.
2 comments

Anecdotally, I've never had a virus on Windows dating back to Win98. But my extended family have had multiple on OSX.

My point is that both are very vulnerable, precautions are what keeps you safe.

>Anecdotally, I've never had a virus on Windows dating back to Win98. But my extended family have had multiple on OSX.

Did they really have viruses (of which for OS X there are very few and far between, to the point of lore) or trojans?

OSX has a more solid track record, but Windows has also undergone a lot of change since the Vista rebuild to address many of it's more trivial exploits.

Anyone remember when you could click Cancel in the login screen and get access to the desktop? Good times. :)

> Anecdotally, I have never had a virus on Mac (that I detected) and neither did any friends, but Windows got infected all the time.

If you're getting infected all the time using Windows, you're doing something stupid. The operating system provides the vulnerabilities, but you might want to reassess how you're using your software.

>If you're getting infected all the time using Windows, you're doing something stupid.

Or, you know, just switch to an OS where you don't.

Where you don't what, exactly? Run software from untrustworthy sources that contains viruses? Okay, but you don't need to change platforms to do that.
Good luck for the average person with Windows, when their laptop might come with spyware, and sometimes even a complete rootkit, directly from the OEM.

http://www.macnn.com/articles/16/06/01/researchers.show.that...

http://www.zdnet.com/article/lenovo-rootkit-ensured-its-soft...

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/now-three-pre-installed-malware...

Eventhough these are bad, they are not viruses and do not fit the anecdote. If you are constantly getting viruses (Note not preinstalled rootkits or other stuff) than you are doing something wrong, I don't think we have to argue about that right?