Should I be installing McAfee on a MacBook Pro?

Dennis E. Taylor

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I asked this question in the "Forced Microsoft Updates", but it really should have its own thread.

I pulled the trigger yesterday--bought a MacBook Pro. But I'm an Apple noob, so I'm very slowly going through setup.

McAfee does sell a Mac version of their anti-virus package, but I'm wondering how many Mac users actually buy something like this (McAfee, Norton, whatever). Is the built-in firewall (which I've already activated) good enough? And should I be cranking the firewall settings up to full strength?
 

lizmonster

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I asked this question in the "Forced Microsoft Updates", but it really should have its own thread.

I pulled the trigger yesterday--bought a MacBook Pro. But I'm an Apple noob, so I'm very slowly going through setup.

McAfee does sell a Mac version of their anti-virus package, but I'm wondering how many Mac users actually buy something like this (McAfee, Norton, whatever). Is the built-in firewall (which I've already activated) good enough? And should I be cranking the firewall settings up to full strength?

The saying in Mac communities of my acquaintance is that AV programs on the Mac are viruses themselves. :)

At my last job, I had to run McAfee in order to connect to the corporate network. It caused nothing but problems. Those of us running Macs (about 80% of the dev staff, IIRC) turned off every feature except the few that the network was looking for, and otherwise ignored it. During my tenure at the company, it never caught a single thing.

OS X is NOT immune to infection, of course; but the ones I hear about show up in things like counterfeit installers (if you must run Flash, ALWAYS go directly to adobe.com and download it there).

A firewall isn't virus protection, btw. A firewall is designed to make your system hard to break into, but it won't protect you if you download or open an infected file.

As always, the plural of anecdote is not data - but I've been running OS X since 2001, and I've never run AV on my home systems. I'm calling the lightning by saying so, but...so far, so good. :)
 

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I suggest that you install Sophos or MacAfee or whatever other runs-all-the-time in the background anti virus app of your choice.

I would NOT use Norton Anti Virus.

I would also download and install the free version of Malware Bytes, and run it once a month or so; it's very good about removing adware etc.

I suggest that you set your Security prefs under General to only allow apps from Apple and identified developers.

I also strongly encourage you not to run as Admin. Have an Admin account but the account you use every day should not be Admin.

I do not run as Admin. It's easy to authenticate if you need to be Admin to install something but not running as Admin will vastly reduce the potential for disaster.

I am a registered Apple developer, I write books about Apple technology, and have been using Macs since 1989.

Macs have been very very safe for a long time; there's now ransom ware for Macs, and some really nasty Trojans. Run safe.
 
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