80 percent of viruses love Windows 7

[+Warwagon MVC]

So you mean, if you download a fake AV and then when go to run it, UAC appears and you click continue, you mean it will actually install?????? OMG!!!!.

[ahhell]

This is why Microsoft will always going to lose more and more markets. They brainwashed their users telling them that this is the more secure and better windows yet.

MS users Brainwashed? LOL

Capt Irony asplodes!!!!!!

[StrikedOut]

And if Microsoft do something in Win 8 to prevent viruses/malware being installed, say...... bundle Security Essentials with the OS... Who will be the first to file the anti-trust case?

It's simple. The most dangerous component of any PC/mac is the user. If you run any unknown app then you deserve to have your files deleted.

[Subject Delta]

This is why Microsoft will always going to lose more and more markets. They brainwashed their users telling them that this is the more secure and better windows yet. But its just another windows version like all previous. Microsoft need really to do something from scrath for windows 8 or Apple will keep getting more market shares!!!

The only brainwashed one here is you, Windows 7 and Vista are infinitely more secure than XP ever was. Windows 7 has a lot of the same underlying code as XP and Vista so stating that it is still vulnerable to viruses is just another large case of stating the bleeding obvious.

Oh and the UAC in 7 wasn't even designed to be more secure, it was designed to be less intrusive, auto elevation actually theoretically makes it marginally less secure. Sophos need to get their facts straight and stop sensationalising things to sell their products

Edited November 4, 2009 by Frank Fontaine

[Ricardo Gil]

Well it's not Apple per se.. it's what's happening in the media with companies.. Apple is just coming out with more and more stupidity trying to present Windows in some false light. Sophos is doing useless tests that have no connection with reality because Microsoft now has an anti-virus solution that's free and very effective and I'm sure we wont' see the end of it soon. Seems that companies have more and more PR campaigns that spit on Windows instead of actually showing why their products are better.

Well OK, I know what you mean, but your comment was really out of context in this thread. This is about Sophos and Microsoft, let's not derail this even further.

Please just shut up, Cabron. I own a Mac and love it, but I know its limitations. I'm just as open to having all my user files deleted by a virus as any Windows machine is. Snow Leopard and Windows 7 are very similar, and I don't see one being better than the other when you look at the two side by side. It just boils down to personal preference.

However, I think that both Microsoft and Apple should be careful in lulling their users into a false sense of security just to get sales. That's the kind of crap that leads to pointless class action lawsuits.

Best comment so far (Y)

[undu]

80%? What a load of horsecrap.

[_neutrino Veteran]

i can fully understand as to why this would be accurate being that they did not really change that much from vista to 7 so if the virus/malware worked in vista there is a rather large chance that it would work under Win 7 as well. Just my opinion though.

[BajiRav]

Please just shut up, Cabron. I own a Mac and love it, but I know its limitations. I'm just as open to having all my user files deleted by a virus as any Windows machine is. Snow Leopard and Windows 7 are very similar, and I don't see one being better than the other when you look at the two side by side. It just boils down to personal preference.

However, I think that both Microsoft and Apple should be careful in lulling their users into a false sense of security just to get sales. That's the kind of crap that leads to pointless class action lawsuits.

QFT

[Growled Member]

So you mean, if you download a fake AV and then when go to run it, UAC appears and you click continue, you mean it will actually install?????? OMG!!!!.

Just what I was thinking. Not all the security programs in the world can help a stupid user.

[Lechio]

80 percent of viruses love Windows 7

Got to love backwards compatibility.

[YounGMessiah]

80% of dumb sh**s who dont know how to be safe using their computer.. Thats more believable..

[shockz]

Wow, not having an antivirus seems really unfair, but at least it'll be interesting to hear from the 'I never run an antivurs and never have security problems on Windows' crowd.

This describes me. :p

I haven't used antivirus since XP. I've never had any infections (well at least I don't think I've ever). If you know where to stay away from, and the software you are using doesn't have massive security holes, you should be fine.

During the betas of 7 and Vista, before I'd upgrade to the new build, I'd install a scanner just to see, and not to my surprise, I was fine.

If you stay away from shotty sites, goofy chain mail attachments, make sure your software is up to date, and use a e-mail provider that scans incoming e-mails, you should be pretty safe.

[iamwhoiam]

Also, it was AV companies who forced Microsoft to open up/weaken it's x64 kernel so they could have access to the OS's higher functions... I believe they bitched to the EU about this.

The main culprit in that case was Symantec. They didn't want to have to rewrite the back end to make it work, so they complained that they couldn't make it work with the new kernel protections and considering other security vendors had no issues making their apps work with the new OS (Vista), Microsoft should have sued Symantec in to oblivion for filing a false suit.

Please just shut up, Cabron. I own a Mac and love it, but I know its limitations. I'm just as open to having all my user files deleted by a virus as any Windows machine is. Snow Leopard and Windows 7 are very similar, and I don't see one being better than the other when you look at the two side by side. It just boils down to personal preference.

You're also open to having your files deleted by the OS. No need for malicious software there. :laugh:

This describes me. :p

I haven't used antivirus since XP. I've never had any infections (well at least I don't think I've ever). If you know where to stay away from, and the software you are using doesn't have massive security holes, you should be fine.

During the betas of 7 and Vista, before I'd upgrade to the new build, I'd install a scanner just to see, and not to my surprise, I was fine.

If you stay away from shotty sites, goofy chain mail attachments, make sure your software is up to date, and use a e-mail provider that scans incoming e-mails, you should be pretty safe.

True, to a point. I have security software installed not to protect me from me, but from others who connect in to the network.

[Unrealistic]

Sweet, all this did was confirm my desire to NOT run Sophos.

[hdood]

That report is so light on details and it is clearly to drive more sales for Sophos but was there any doubt that if you run *any* malware in user context, it will damage the system? Say there is a virus that reads user's address book and then spams all contacts using the default mail client.... that will work equally good on a Mac or Linux or any damn OS.

Yes, it has nothing to do with Windows. A virus is just malicious self-replicating code, which normally embeds itself in other executables (versus a trojan which is a program that pretends to be something else, like a key generator, but turns out to be malicious) so that when the user runs the program, he gets infected. If you add the ability to infect systems automatically by exploiting bugs, you've got a worm.

UAC isn't that relevant here. It's not a security barrier, and it's not designed to stop malware. Technically speaking most malware doesn't really need to be written to need admin access at all. They can spy on you, steal your files, use the network, hide from task manager, make themselves automatically load just as a standard user, and so on.

If they got admin, that would just be a bonus that would make it harder to remove, and that would give the malware the ability to infect other users (most systems are single-user, so this isn't relevan). It could also end up impacting system stability.

If you only were to run the malware as a standard user you would actually risk giving it admin access anyway, because if can hijack elevation requests of something you think is legitimate. In other words you don't really know whether the whole system has been compromised or not even in this scenario.

The only thing that can protect against malware is antivirus software, which can at least attempt to block known threats before they have a chance to execute. This should also be combined with the habit of never running any executables at all unless you really have to and know you can trust them. This is hard to get people to do.

Most Windows infections these days are because the user voluntarily ran something he shouldn't have. This is hard to prevent, as it takes advantage of the user and not any bugs in the OS.

[sabrex]

OK, well I guess if that's that case then Microsoft should start bundling Security Essentials with Windows 7 ... I mean this IS what Sophos is suggesting they need to do, isn't it? They're not going to whine and moan about it if Microsoft includes it, are they? Sophos? Talk to me babe...

[mpm174]

been using 7 since alpha and never used anti-virus, dont be retarded and u wont get a virus ... problem solved

[CuCumber]

Please just shut up, Cabron. I own a Mac and love it, but I know its limitations. I'm just as open to having all my user files deleted by a virus as any Windows machine is.

I wasn't aware of that kind of virus for OS X. Wanna share some details?

[BajiRav]

I wasn't aware of that kind of virus for OS X. Wanna share some details?

It's called OS.X/UzGuestAccLOLz

[Elliott]

I wasn't aware of that kind of virus for OS X. Wanna share some details?

There's no actual virus out there like that, but it wouldn't be hard to code one and make it work. Hell, just rm -rf ~/* would work. It doesn't even need elevated privileges.

It's called OS.X/UzGuestAccLOLz

I don't want to sound like a denier here because I know the bug exists and it's a serious flaw, but it's still not common and can simply be fixed by disabling and re-enabling the guest account. It only happens on installations of Snow Leopard that were upgraded from Leopard installations with the guest account enabled. The guest account toggle I mentioned fixes it because it sets it up like Snow Leopard expects it to be set up.

Not sure how Apple or any of the developers beta testing Snow Leopard (me included) missed it, but oh well. Running Time Machine just became all the more important. :p

Edited November 4, 2009 by Elliott

[BajiRav]

There's no actual virus out there like that, but it wouldn't be hard to code one and make it work. Hell, just rm -rf ~/* would work. It doesn't even need elevated privileges.

I don't want to sound like a denier here because I know the bug exists and it's a serious flaw, but it's still not common and can simply be fixed by disabling and re-enabling the guest account. It only happens on installations of Snow Leopard that were upgraded from Leopard installations with the guest account enabled. The guest account toggle I mentioned fixes it because it sets it up like Snow Leopard expects it to be set up.

Not sure how Apple or any of the developers beta testing Snow Leopard (me included) missed it, but oh well. Running Time Machine just became all the more important. :p

I know, I was just showing how foolish his ant-Window posts are. All it takes is one bad thing to tarnish the name, which the guest acc thing did for OS X. As per his logic, not mine. ;)

I don't really care, I was primarily a OS X user from late 2004-early 2007 (when I switched to Vista). I have used OS X panther through leopard and almost all versions of Windows. It's down to what you like/prefer. People like that dude are just...trolls.

[CuCumber]

There's no actual virus out there like that, but it wouldn't be hard to code one and make it work.

Well maybe we'll sit and wait for it to actually materialize before making false claims.

[Subject Delta]

Well maybe we'll sit and wait for it to actually materialize before making false claims.

At the Pwn2Own contests, the macs always get hacked first. 'Nuff said.

[HardSide]

Read the article, I quickly ran to the closest computer store bought myself a mac, apparently i had to pay extra money for a non-pink version. I loaded it up, saw that I cannot run any actual good programs, returned it. And now I can say im back to my crazy virus loving Windows 7. RAWR!

[Elliott]

At the Pwn2Own contests, the macs always get hacked first. 'Nuff said.

Hacked, yea. Apple's managed to fix those vulnerabilities (usually involving third-party libraries in things like Safari or DNS). Viruses, not yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if someone managed to create one that could outbreak.

Read the article, I quickly ran to the closest computer store bought myself a mac, apparently i had to pay extra money for a non-pink version. I loaded it up, saw that I cannot run any actual good programs, returned it. And now I can say im back to my crazy virus loving Windows 7. RAWR!

Funny you should say that. I loaded up Windows 7 in Boot Camp, saw that I couldn't run any "actual good programs" and uninstalled it. It's called a choice, buddy.