Do you think that it might finally be time to go install the ol' antivirus software on a trusty OS X system?

Hello Dani,

I am behind a firewall, and have managed to avoid internet spam. Thus, I do not see much stuff fly by me. But then again, I am not running MS Office and having files with macros sent to me either.

That said, I think that any responsible computer owner should have antivirus at the ready. I am liking McAfee, but am evaluating Sophos as we speak on both my 2000 server, linux server, and Macintosh OS X. SO far, so good.

I think that you should start evaluating the software, as any computer that has electricity to it, and a valid OS, is prone to some sort of infection.

Be aware that VIREX from McAfee still disrupts Palm OS operations on a Macintosh.

Christian

I've been using macs most hours of most days now since the mac plus came out around '86. My first modem was a 14k in the days when that was all there was, and for the last 5 years I've been on line on broad-band most of the time, I've never knowingly experienced a virus, I do have some virus protection running, it just tells me no problem every time it runs.
Maybe it helps that I have an aversion to all things Microsoft, I don't know, I just find that most of the problems I have ever had, have been whilst using MS software.
I do however suffer from a massive amount of spam, and so I am interested in your firewall, any recommendations would be appreciated.

Hello,

A firewall, by definition, prevents network attacks from getting into your network. Think of it like a breakwater on a large lake... big waves hit the breakwater, but on the other side, where the boats in docks are, the waves are much smaller, and calmer.

Firewalls cannot tell between real email messages and spam. To the firewall, they are a bunch of bits and packets. A second type of defense is required: either you setup some sort of email scanner (I have a server between the internet and my home computer, so I can do this) that will remove spam messages, or you have your email program such as Eudora apply filters, and send all the crap one direction.

The only real way to get away from Spam is to change your email address, and hope the crap does not follow you. Avoid posting your email on web pages and web forums... and newsgroups. It is amazing how long archives like google keep email address alive and well for robots to scan and collect.

If you need to, create a hotmail or yahoo account and use that for your public email transactions. Sacrifice that account for crap management... and accept that you might find one legitimate message out of 500 in there.

Christian

Thanks, that's pretty much what I thought, but you've made the choices much clearer. I would love to have just one email address, a one I realy like, but I can see I'd never escape the spam.
I do use a "tools and rules" self made list of 'froms' and 'message content' alerts to redirect spam to a delete file, but the list keeps growing as the spammers find another ways to spell out their crap, and it takes a lot of time to maintain.
It really is a great shame the web has to have this pollution, I would love to get a few of my frail old relatives emailing and surfing (there's not a lot else they can do), but if they received the spam I do, they'd die of shock!
Thanks again for your reply.