[dayglored]

Hi Swordmaker,

I'll just say that it's worth noting that those slams against Macs are the same tired old tech-blog writer whore list of unworth complaints. Same ones as for the last, what, 5? 7? more? years.

1. "When Apple sells more Macs they'll be attacked more." As though the number out there already isn't enough of a target, compared to other non-Windows targets like certain routers that get attacked plenty.

2. So-called "hacking competitions". These have always been a joke, now they're an industry embarrassment to anyone with a technical brain. Why not compare how long their d!cks are and leave the computers out of it? It would be just as meaningful as what they do now.

3. "UAC on Windows is an effective mechanism and raises Windows to the level of security of OS X." Not really. It raises Windows to the same "Mother-May-I?" level of "security" provided by the Mac's prompts for an administrative user's password. It's useful in both cases, and a necessary part of the picture on any operating system, but it doesn't address the real point of true system security.

The real point is that the operating system should provide the smallest and strongest attack surface, and defend that surface itself in a way that does not require the user to make difficult and annoying decisions. Period.

And Apple's OS X, based on BSD Unix with a designed-in, not bolted-on-afterward, approach to security, will continue to have the smaller, stronger, and better defended attack surface for the foreseeable future. Windows has gotten much better over the years, and it's largely on a par with OS X with regard to most aspects of user security. But its internal complexity works against the goal of a simple, strong structure with inherently minimal attackable characteristics. That's just a fact.

[Scutter]

And Apple's OS X, based on BSD Unix with a designed-in, not bolted-on-afterward, approach to security, will continue to have the smaller, stronger, and better defended attack surface for the foreseeable future. Windows has gotten much better over the years, and it's largely on a par with OS X with regard to most aspects of user security. But its internal complexity works against the goal of a simple, strong structure with inherently minimal attackable characteristics. That's just a fact.

The Windows security model, which originated in Windows NT, was designed in from the start. Windows users are, unfortunately, used to running as an Administrator (*nix equivalent of root). UAC is essentially the same thing as the sudo feature on Linux and Mac. It's not some "bolt on".