Answer Guy Central

An amazing idea: the worst threat to security in your computer may not be a virus, or a piece of stray mal-ware. It’s your operating system.

Or so says Brian Krebs, blogging for The Washington Post. And he’s probably right.

The issue, says Krebs, is that most of the bad stuff that tries to infect your computer does so by mucking around in your operating system, and that your operating system gets harder and harder to protect over time. This is true.

Further, Krebs argues that Windows users have the biggest problems, because it’s Windows being targeted by a huge percentage of virus writers. This is also true.

What’s fascinating (and please remember that this is not truly a Windows issue; Macintosh and Linux computers get viruses, too) is his solution: you can completely avoid having sensitive data stolen by doing something that is becoming more and more simple: don’t type anything or use shopping or banking web site on a computer  unless you boot that computer from a clean, protected, pristine CD or DVD-based copy of the operating system.

This is almost a brilliant idea. Human nature being what it is (lazy) and technology understanding being what it is (low), the idea means very little here in the real world. But with Virtual Computers becoming more and more prevalent, it’s an idea that will lead to real solutions, and soon.

THAT’S Business Change.

Let the nasty notes fly . . .

So this week Apple releases Snow Leopard. It’s the latest and greatest version of the Macintosh OS, otherwise known as OS X Version 10.6. And I have to tip my hat to them; it’s a great release for many reasons, and at just $30 it will be a great seller (And should be!), even though you might not notice the differences from what’s in Macintosh OS X version 10.5.

Volumes have been written already, and my pal David Pogue at the New York Times has covered this subject as exhaustively and accessibly as anyone. I recommend his take on the subject highly.

But for me the real issue is one that gets discussed . . . oddly every time it comes up. Apple has taken steps to address it in Snow Leopard, and it goes to our topic of business change:

Macintosh Computers Are No More Safe From Viruses than Windows Computers

Not a popular position to take when Apple fans are in the room, and one that Windows users stopped caring about a long time ago; they simply deal with the reality of viruses, spyware, and other such nuisances as part of their day.  But one of the things that Apple is acknowledging in Snow Leopard is exactly that: Macintosh computers are virus-susceptible, and steps need to be taken to protect them.

A tip of my hat to Apple for taking steps on your behalf, and I’ll be fair: big raspberries to Microsoft for making you deal with the subject (almost) all by yourself. The real message for you, though, is this:

If you’re going to believe what you read, make sure your reading material is coming from sources you can trust.

Yes, it’s true. After many years of claiming that their products are impervious to viruses, Apple has egg all over its face.

Or rather, is the egg all over its face.

I’ve resisted commenting on the iPhone price drop debacle. Let’s get this out of the way: my opinion is that even in a market where prices free-fall (and I argue that the iPhone is not a typical mobile phone, so this doesn’t apply, anyway), Apple has screwed its early-adopter customers to a wall dropping the price of the iPhone by $200 just two months after its initial, much-hyped release. No news there; everybody thinks so.

Have you noticed, though, that the very same week Apple chopped the iPhone’s price news broke that NBC had decided to stop distributing its television programs in the iTunes store? And that Apple wants to cut the price of video downloads from $1.99 to $.99? AND that the rumor mill is churning that Apple is about to start doing movie rentals in the iTunes store?

I saw a commentary this week that Apple has become the new Microsoft, with the implication being that they have gained such strong powers in a particular market that they are now hated by almost everyone…even their own users. The other day, a friend who loves her Macintosh actually commented that OS X is getting to be as bad as Windows since they are both “just Unix, anyway”.

The Mac OS is far more resistant to attack than Windows, and likely always will be. But Apple itself has begun to look like a virus. Let’s see if this little bug does good, or bad.

Subscribe to this Blog using your favorite Reader