Mac Virus?

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Is it possible to get a virus on a Mac? Both mine and my wife's Mac's have been acting extremely strange the past few weeks. Programs that we use on a daily basis; ex: Skype, Safari, Iphoto, have been crashing. We are also having issues with our mailbox with email accounts disappearing and reappearing and getting disabled and re-enabled.

I'm considering backing up the important crap on my computer(photos, Itunes, etc)then doing a wipe of my computer and fresh install of Snow Leapord OS - if that's possible, I wouldn't know the first thing to do in order to complete that but I"m sure I can find it on the web. Do you think this would solve the issues that I"m having?

I have Mackeeper installed and the virus/threat scans haven't turned up anything.....
 
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Is it possible to get a virus on a Mac?
Virus, no...because there currently aren't any to infect your Mac that exist in the wild. Trojan Horse, maybe (though not terribly likely), see:

Here is an excellent up to date Web site on the topic of Macintosh malware 
that you might find illuminating:
 http://www.reedcorner.net/thomas/guides/macvirus/



...and an associated Macintosh Malware Catalog
Reed Corner Design

There really isn't any malware out there that would be causing the symptoms that you are describing. In general, when your Macintosh starts acting strangely, the first thing that you should suspect *isn't* malware.

Both mine and my wife's Mac's have been acting extremely strange the past few weeks. Programs that we use on a daily basis; ex: Skype, Safari, Iphoto, have been crashing. We are also having issues with our mailbox with email accounts disappearing and reappearing and getting disabled and re-enabled.

To establish a baseline for troubleshooting, I suggest that you run all of the suggested routine maintenance that seems applicable here:
OS X Maintenance And Troubleshooting

That might fix the problem by itself. If it doesn't, the next thing to do is to create a new user account on your Mac,
(Open the "Accounts" pane of System Preferences, click the padlock and enter your administrator password, then press the "+" (plus) button to create the new user. You'll probably want to check the box for "Allow this user to administer this computer.")
...log out, and then back in as the new user. If your problems are now gone, the problem is in your user account. If the problems still persist, they are either in your main system, or they are being caused by a hardware problem. Let me know what you find, and then we can troubleshoot from there.

You might also want to try disabling any software that you have recently installed that required an installer to install (e.g. anti-virus software, programs that change the way that the system functions, etc.) and see if things get better. The same for any third-party hardware you have recently installed, especially a USB hub or a RAM upgrade.

I'm considering backing up the important crap on my computer(photos, Itunes, etc)then doing a wipe of my computer and fresh install of Snow Leapord OS - if that's possible, I wouldn't know the first thing to do in order to complete that but I"m sure I can find it on the web. Do you think this would solve the issues that I"m having?

I think that this will be a lot of work, and it may not even help. It's best to save that as a last resort.

I have Mackeeper installed and the virus/threat scans haven't turned up anything.....

It's hard to find something that doesn't exist.

Have your problems only been in existence since you installed MacKeeper? There are reports from users on the Internet whose problems were caused by MacKeeper. You might want to try uninstalling it and seeing if things get better.

___________________________________________

Randy B. Singer
Co-author of The Macintosh Bible (4th, 5th, and 6th editions)

Macintosh OS X Routine Maintenance
OS X Maintenance And Troubleshooting
___________________________________________
 
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I'm considering backing up the important crap on my computer(photos, Itunes, etc)

Don't consider backing up...DO IT. No matter what is going on with your Mac, it is extremely important to keep all of your importnat files backed up, even if it's only to Time Machine. Believe me, when (not if, when) your HDD goes, you'll wish you'd had a backup!
 

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