[andretan]

I just heard about this ClamXav, an antivirus app for OS X.

Just curious, how many here are using it? (Or other antivirus apps)

I'm not the developer or anything here, just a guy who wants to know how effective are these antivirus apps on OS X, since I last heard Virex had some problems (or whatever) with Tiger.

Cheerios,
Andre

[Millennium]

It is a very good idea to run antivirus software on your Mac. Even though there are no OSX-specific viruses at present, there are some scenarios to watch out for.

• If you use Microsoft products with macro support, you can catch viruses written for these programs.
• If you use Classic, viruses written for OS9 can still work.
• If you use Virtual PC with Windows installed, viruses written for Windows can still affect the emulated PC.

In all of these cases, viruses will be limited in terms of what they can do. Macro viruses often won't work right at all because they're so poorly written, but bugs in these viruses can cause other, unintended forms of damage. Few viruses for OS9 were ever written, and most of those were known for being badly written as well, but they can theoretically affect the entire machine since Classic runs as root. Windows viruses can only infect the emulated PC, not the Mac side (they can pass things into any folders you've shared between the environments, but shouldn't be able to get outside them).

In other words, if you run any of these programs, there is a very real need to run antivirus software. Even if you don't use Classic or any Microsoft products, however, it's a good idea to run anyivirus software anyway. OSX cannot catch viruses written for other platforms, but those viruses aren't destroyed simply by coming into contact with an OSX machine, so if you pass the files on to other people they may still be able to catch the viruses therein. Also, although OSX's security is much better than that of Windows, we are not invincible; it is only a matter of time before a virus of some kind is written. If you're running antivirus software then that day comes, you will be prepared.

All of this said, avoid Virex. It was very good on OS9, but the OSX implementation has a very poor reputation. Intego and Sophos make the most reputable antivirus products for OSX, but ClamXav has been improving greatly as of late, and is certainly something worth keeping an eye on. If I'm not mistaken, Apple includes ClamAV (the virus-engine scanning which also ClamXav) in OSX Server, and so ClamXav may be able to take greater advantage of this in the future.

[glyph]

I've been using ClamXav for the last week. I'm not really worried about a virus damaging my machine, but I'm curious what I'm getting in my e-mail - as I get alot of junk mail.

I've gotten about 6 or 7 exploits so far. The bad part about this program is if you choose to quarantine an infected e-mail, it will move the whole e-mail directory ( Junk folder for example ) to quaratine; it won't specify which particular e-mail is the culprit. You can chose not to quarantine anything and still get information on whether or not your e-mail is infected. You can then manually delete the files.

[sieb]

It would be a good idea if you used your machine on a windows network. Even if it didn't affect you, you can still be a carrier for it into an environment it can affect.

[Thinine]

If you're aware of what you download or open at all, it's completely unnecessary.