Virus,Spyware,malware etc for a semi noob

I have been looking for some Virus/spyware/malware etc you know anything along those lines type of whatever you want to call em that do the harm they do.

I have yet to find anything worthwhile, having been a PC guy for so long I was accustomed to running multiple programs which bogged down and brought my machine to a standstill if I wanted to do anything secure like online banking etc.

I saw the thread on Antivirus and malware for Mac OS X and downloaded ClamXav and seems pretty cool am scanning now the Sentry feature for constant scanning seems really good almost a firewall of sorts, I am also running Sophos Antivirus and to be honest I am not sure if it works or not as its not found anything since I installed maybe like 1 item. Anyone have good or bad experience with Sophos?

In the past i have downloaded files from sites like Letitbit,Turbobit,Filesonic and Hotfile and although I never had any problems least that I was aware of I want to clean up my drive of junk I don't need for starters. I know unless I am sure what and from whom I am downloading I shouldn't but lets be honest we have all done it right.

Does anyone have any other recommendations? free perhaps. That will help with a combination on based from sites I visit, cookies that are dropped (I know from PC's that cookies can have some red flags),possible malware,and viruses, spyware etc. When I had a PC I tried paid stuff like Symantec,McAfee and the free version of Avast and as I mentioned before they bogged down my machine big time and not sure if they are any less of memory hogs on the MAC.

I apologize if this is in the wrong section as I am a new member to the forum and couldn't find the right section.

Do you really need me to tell you that there aren't any viruses for the Mac, and that most of that junk you've downloaded will do nothing for you at all except suck up resources?

My own personal opinion on this is that if you have the least bit of common sense and avoid pirated software, you have NO need of ANY anti- anything program.

Also, not sure how you missed this: http://www.mac-forums.com/forums/sw...-official-antivirus-malware-firewall-faq.html

chas_m said:

Do you really need me to tell you that there aren't any viruses for the Mac, and that most of that junk you've downloaded will do nothing for you at all except suck up resources?

My own personal opinion on this is that if you have the least bit of common sense and avoid pirated software, you have NO need of ANY anti- anything program.

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I totally agree with chas_m There really is no need for Antivirus on your MAc. Unless you have some secret squirrel stuff to hide trash them all and enjoy your Mac

chas_m said:

Also, not sure how you missed this: http://www.mac-forums.com/forums/sw...-official-antivirus-malware-firewall-faq.html

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I think you might have missed it but they did

ElectroBats said:

I saw the thread on Antivirus and malware for Mac OS X and downloaded ClamXav and seems pretty cool

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Enough of these threads surely! Use the pigging search engine fercrissakes!!!!

Kevriano said:

Enough of these threads surely! Use the pigging search engine fercrissakes!!!!

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HAHAHAHAHA Having a good W/end Kev

Wow, tough crowd... I won't ask any questions here without a thorough search.

To the OP, I'm also a new convert to Mac and like most "normal" people who switch to Mac from PC your question is one of the first things new users research and ask questions about.

Like the others here have said there is no real reason to be overly concerned with viruses with the Mac OS. That being said, I have read some articles on a couple tech sites that warn that spyware like OSX/OpinionSpy is something to be aware of.

I'm still doing my homework and have only begun to wade through this forum and others like it to become more educated. In the meantime I will just use some common sense when downloading and/or opening unknown files and should be safe. However, I'm certainly not going to bury my head in the sand and believe I have no worries now that I have a Mac. The jerks who write spyware and virus apps have determined that there are not enough Mac's out there worth their time and effort. However, trends point to Mac's getting increasingly more popular so that may change.

Good luck with the new Mac!

iTimmac said:

Wow, tough crowd... I won't ask any questions here without a thorough search.

To the OP, I'm also a new convert to Mac and like most "normal" people who switch to Mac from PC your question is one of the first things new users research and ask questions about.

Like the others here have said there is no real reason to be overly concerned with viruses with the Mac OS. That being said, I have read some articles on a couple tech sites that warn that spyware like OSX/OpinionSpy is something to be aware of.

I'm still doing my homework and have only begun to wade through this forum and others like it to become more educated. In the meantime I will just use some common sense when downloading and/or opening unknown files and should be safe. However, I'm certainly not going to bury my head in the sand and believe I have no worries now that I have a Mac. The jerks who write spyware and virus apps have determined that there are not enough Mac's out there worth their time and effort. However, trends point to Mac's getting increasingly more popular so that may change.

Good luck with the new Mac!

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They have been saying this for years so far it has not materialized.

osxx said:

They have been saying this for years so far it has not materialized.

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I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it doesn't. The main reason I jumped from PC was because of all the malware, spyware and viruses the PC is susceptible to. My last PC ran the newest version of McAfee and had all the latest updates and I still got burned. I was just fed up... Had to deal with a slowed down PC due to all the resources that the virus software ate up and still got infected.

iTimmac said:

The jerks who write spyware and virus apps have determined that there are not enough Mac's out there worth their time and effort. However, trends point to Mac's getting increasingly more popular so that may change.

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There are numerous articles online and threads in this forum and others that debunk that market share argument. It has more to do with the security of the OS itself. Not being the virus geek, I can't make the argument myself, but I'm sure you could find it, yep, with a little searching.