Apple and Malware: Think Different

I’m seeing quite a bit of coverage in the mainstream press recently about the intersection of Mac, security generally, and malware specifically. I’m not going to call out once again any kind of reasoned argument about why Mac is not a special and unique snowflake when it comes to security and why it has the same problems as other platforms, despite a lower incidence of malware due to other factors. I’ve done that enough in the past that I’ll spare you any wandering diatribe about it today.

However, I did want to call out this coverage and note that I think it’s no coincidence that Apple is getting this attention now.   In the past, I’ve wondered how Apple has managed to avoid – in seemingly Teflon fashion – any real need to address the security-related aspects of its product-set (like everybody else, they have their own unique set of security problems).  Up to now, the community has been very resistant to accept that there’s anything to worry about from a security angle.  But I think that view could be changing slightly based on the coverage.

Specifically, it’s possible that the user community is responding to the location/iPhone fiasco that’s been developing over the past week or so.  In other words, in the past when Apple has maintained in their Mac marketing that security is less of an issue, members of the community have given Apple the benefit of the doubt.  So I’m wondering if they may have forfeited their Teflon privileges through the location debacle?  Would be interesting if so.

Anyway, I call it out only to note the trend.  I’m interested to see if it’ll continue or if some distance on the location issue will return the situation to status-quo.

Image Source: igadgetszone.com