Bill Gates: "security guys break the Mac every single day"

Considering Windows has to deal with about 98% of viruses, trojans and all round malicious things on the internet...it's pretty good. With Macintosh not suffering any major virus attacks...for it to suffer any kind of malicous damage is just proof that the system fails.

I also find it amusing that people here think that they know more than one of the men that revolutionized computer software systems of the modern day.

I laugh at all of you, with pointed fingers

"Nowadays, security guys break the Mac every single day. Every single day, they come out with a total exploit, your machine can be taken over totally. I dare anybody to do that once a month on the Windows machine."

That's the lamest thing I've ever heard. Bill Gates thinks he's an iCon who thinks that his misleading words can make people believe, saying that a Mac will be exploited EVERY SINGLE DAY & ONCE A MONTH on Windows machine, what kind of a lame statement is that?

People, this really isn't about Mac VS Windows. This is only about Gates stomping on the OS X to make everybody thinks his astala-VISTA OS is better than Mac OS X. To Gates-worshippers, this is called hynoptizing/brain-washing or whatever you wanna call it.

For me, using either Windows or OS X is only like using only either one side of the brain. Knowing to utilize cross platform is a huge advantage. Knowing Linux will be an awesome bonus too.

One more thing, VISTA requires a ridiculous criteria spec to run it. OS X needs only 2 gig-plus HD space & 512MB RAM to run, while Linux only needs about a gig HD & 256 RAM to run. Vista is a big joke, 4GB HD space & 1 GB RAM to run??
Means if you're a budget user, forget about it.

>>Nobody is really targeting any Mac machines at this point in time though; >>simply put, nobody is using them for servers.

Sure, the number 1 online music store runs on OS X Server, and it isn't a target. Neither is the online Apple store. I mean, what hacker actually wants reams of transaction data from the iTunes music store. That wouldn't be a target at all.
Seriously, I've heard Apple brass talking about the number of attacks their web stores go through, and how OS X server handles them. Have you seen the report about how Apple's web commerce sites were compromised and data was stolen? Neither have I.

Time to send Gates to the Happy Happy Hospital for the Critically Insane!

Dave the Security Analyst -

I looked at the list of exploits - the remote ones are the ones I would worry about as a desktop user - there are eight listed - at least one of these depends on the "safe file" option in Safari which almost everyone would agree should be off by default. I also believe some of these have been patched. I suppose their are probably others not listed, but let just say the eight are representative of the potential for being owned.

If I look at Linux, there are a lot more remote exploits listed - I realize that there are different flavors of Linux, but certainly OSX isn't any worse than Linux in this regard.

If I look at Windows, I can't even count the number of remote exploits, but its definately more than all of the OSX exploits (remote,local and DOS) put together. Holy Crap, why wouldn't you try to crack Windows first, so many to choose from.

So speaking in absolute terms, OSX isn't totally secure, but compared to other platforms it seems to be holding its own and compared to Windows its like Fort Knox compared the downtown Detroit.

Am I totally off base here? After all, I'm using the source you linked to.

Hahaha @ 19. Dave the security analyst- we better take his word at face value then! I love internet anonymity!

Stop spouting this crap about Macs not being attacked because of market share- it's absolute BS. It has very little to do with market share, and more to do with vulnerabilities in the kernel, the stacks, and those awesome APIs MS uses. The very fact that those "viruses" for the Mac require you to go through about 14 steps ON YOUR OWN VOLITION show just how lame these arguments are.

At present, there is no virus that will self-propogate or affect Mac users. I'm not running any AV software on my Mac- come get me, Dave!

Funniest thing I heard- OSX has "bigger security issues" ....OH OK! That sounds believable! Please back that one up, because last time I heard, it was Windows will all the credit card details being stolen, and companies being brought to their knees by viruses and trojans and other crap that doesn't happen on the Mac.

Oh, wait- it's all proportional to market share, hey! Nothing to do with the code at all! I could list 50 Fortune 500 companies using OSX for server, or hundreds of Unis using them for their science departments.

And this BSD exploit from 1996, Dave? You're joking right? Please URL us to this fanciful exploit so we can see for ourselves what a MS fanboi you really are...

Bill Gates has lost whatever tenuous hold on reality he once had. He needs to be taken out to pasture. Bill go, give away your money and stop talking trash about Apple. If it weren't for Apple, there would be no Microsoft today. Without Apple, Microsoft would have had to stay with DOS and without a way to come up with Windows 1.0 would have gotten pushed out of that market when IBM came up with OS2.

Sure Bill, Leopard is going to be a copy of Longhorn, a copy of all the stuf you couldn't get into Vista because your crack programming team couldn't design all the promised features in time. Have you forgotten to take your medication again? Face it Bill, Leopard will eat your lunch, dinner & breakfast for years. And now that OS X is in the iPhone, people will also see just how shitty Windows mobile really is. You better retire now Bill, Microsoft's heydays are long gone. Just look at the Zune. You must have known it was going to stink, you even made it s**t brown. Do Microsoft a favor and take Ballmer with you. He is too dumb to wipe his butt unaided. Microsoft needs someone with a clue to run it. You don't even know when the interview segment of the Daily Show is over. What Microsoft needs is the dark side's version of Steve Jobs. Someone who can tell a good product from crap. Neither you Bill nor Ballmer can tell s**t from shinola. Your days at the wheel of Microsoft are over. If you want it to survive you need to get the deadwood (you and Ballmer) out. You need to dump all the shitty old code from Windows and re-write it from scratch. Forget about legacy, cut off the old PCs and old software. They can't run Vista or any of the new stuff. The legacy code just keeps Windows stuck in the past. Dump the registry, join the 21st century. Get someone in there who will have the cojones you and Ballmer lack to clean up that ancient code you stole from Apple in the 1980s.

Lets be realistic. Security experts probably can break into a mac in very little time. There are security holes of every kind (privelage escalation, buffer overruns, etc) on every os (win, mac, linux, unix) that are published almost monthly. So that part is probably true.


Is Vista more secure than Mac? I really doubt it. Unix was built around privelages, where windows bolted it on later.

Security people tell the truth. The only secure machine is not connected to anything, and most likely turned off.

Well, at least I know what will be coming out of M$ fanboys in 2011 - "no, we're not copying leopard, it's called Areas, not Spaces..."

Been using Macs for a good 7 years. Never used a Virus program. Never worried about a email giving me something. Never worried about downloading something.

Do Window users live as carefree as that?