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AskWoody PlusHere are some MacOS tests from AV-TEST.
As you can see, most of the ones tested are pretty good. I recommend further research on review sites if you want to tell them apart. Something to check is if they also scan for Windows malware, as that’s helpful to have.
Malwarebytes is excellent for on demand scans on Windows, but doesn’t offer full system scans on Mac.
Something else to bear in mind, if you have an M1/M2 Mac, is to check if the AV software in question runs natively on these chips or not. I remember looking into this about a year ago and being surprised that some still run through Rosetta, which is obviously going to be a performance hit. Some do run natively on M1/M2, though.
1 user thanked author for this post.
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AskWoody PlusMarch 24, 2023 at 1:47 pm in reply to: Microsoft setting the ball for Windows 12 as it begins adding Cloud PC #2546380And bear in mind that Microsoft cannot afford to chop the legs out from under Office (now rebranded), since Office, and not Windows, is one of Microsoft’s cash cows. Windows as a subscription model might work, then again it might not.
Maybe Microsoft will be happy with the amount of money it is getting from Office subscriptions, or maybe it will think ‘Well, we’re getting all of this money from Office subscriptions, so how about we get a load more money from Windows subscriptions too!’ I know which one my money is on, especially since they’re already doing it with Enterprise subscriptions.
After all, there are free Office alternatives, just like Linux is an alternative to Windows (in fact, not just like, because the free Office alternatives don’t have the complexity of Linux), yet that hasn’t stopped the march of Microsoft/Office 365, because people and companies are wedded to it, just like they’re wedded to Windows.
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AskWoody PlusTo quote my post on the subject from October:
Just because antivirus software can’t access the kernel on MacOS that doesn’t make them useless. They can still detect malware and block it in the user space before it does harm, not to mention that good antivirus software will also detect Windows malware before it can spread to your other machines. MacOS malware is at an all time high and should be taken seriously.
People wouldn’t create two million pieces of malware in a year for MacOS if it is naturally immune to malware! And the Windows machines that you presumably interact with with your Mac certainly aren’t immune to malware either, so it’s good to protect them in advance.
$2000 on a Mac and then skimp on $30/year for antivirus software that takes up 1% of its CPU and memory? That doesn’t make sense to me. As I said on another thread, about Linux antivirus software, which also applies to Macs:
Is it likely that you download malware that targets desktop Linux? If you’re a smart user then probably not, but it’s not about being smart, it’s about the fact that you’re mitigating a low risk high cost scenario with a low opportunity cost activity (running an antivirus), so from a risk management perspective I still think that it makes sense to install one.
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AskWoody PlusFebruary 28, 2023 at 7:15 am in reply to: How to jailbreak ChatGPT and Bing AI — to see their evil twins #2537846Absorbing things that are untrue on the internet and doubling down to defend them. What could be more human?
Seriously though, some of the transcripts linked to in Mr. Livingston’s article certainly have Bing AI reminding me of someone desperately defending something untrue on social media, threats and all, so maybe it has scraped these sources, either as part of its general dataset or as part of ‘Prometheus’.
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AskWoody PlusFebruary 27, 2023 at 4:11 pm in reply to: How to jailbreak ChatGPT and Bing AI — to see their evil twins #2537674It’s impossible to prove that this is the case, but given that Bing AI creates its answers based on things previously written, and since humans have written so much sci-fi about sentient evil AIs, when Bing AI is prompted to explore itself I wonder if it might be calling on these sources.
3 users thanked author for this post.
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AskWoody PlusFebruary 27, 2023 at 2:10 pm in reply to: U.S. cyber official : Microsoft & Twitter look at Apple for better security #2537649This reminds me of the recent, bizarre, news that the Twitter are limiting the use of text message MFA to Twitter Blue subscribers. I say bizarre, but it’s only bizarre relative to how most companies operate, not bizarre relative to how Twitter under Musk operates!
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AskWoody PlusFebruary 25, 2023 at 4:39 pm in reply to: 61 percent of antivirus users in the US rely on free programs #2537248My reference to detection rates was based on the work of AV Comparatives, where Microsoft falls behind most of the big names when it comes to Real World Detection.
It is curious that the security.org article suggests the opposite, though, I agree. I wonder if this is an example of sampling bias – that is, maybe people who pay for AV software are more likely to encounter viruses than those who don’t? I assume that they don’t weight for the number of viruses encountered. Interesting puzzle.
1 user thanked author for this post.
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AskWoody PlusFebruary 25, 2023 at 2:42 pm in reply to: 61 percent of antivirus users in the US rely on free programs #2537241As Microfix and Alex said, I think that most people are just happy to use something for free rather than pay for it, even if tests show that the detection rates are slightly worse.
Not to mention how some of the various paid-for options try to trick users into paying more and more. I recently helped out someone who had bought Norton for £20 and they asked her for £85 for the renewal. And then when she paid, she found out she had been charged twice!
Paid AV software isn’t a monopoly any more, and if they treat their customers like that then they’re going to lose them.
1 user thanked author for this post.
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AskWoody PlusI understand that my post could have been taken as criticism of your post rather than the article, and so I apologise once again for upsetting you and for not being clearer. I hope that you can accept my apology and understand that I was just trying to help.
As you say, a tempest in a teapot.
3 users thanked author for this post.
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AskWoody PlusCAS, I assure you that it was not my intention to upset you, so I apologise if I have done so. There appeared to be either a misunderstanding or a difference of opinion, and I was simply attempting to help clear it up and get everyone on the same page to help further discussion, that’s all. You had used a comparison to an expression in your reply, so a semantic exploration along with a suggestion on how to get everyone on the same page seemed appropriate.
For what it’s worth, I had already thanked you for your original post, although I don’t feel that doing so should be a requirement for being allowed to contribute to the discussion.
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AskWoody PlusI think that geekdom’s point was that AI isn’t the agent here, and semantically the thread title makes it sound like it is.
For example, if someone used a computer to commit fraud, you wouldn’t say that ‘Computers are after your bank account’.
The trick that the phase ‘guns don’t kill people, people kill people’ uses (not that I’m even remotely saying that you’re trying to trick people!) is related to the fact the the word kill has multiple meanings: it uses kill to mean ‘consciously kill’, and uses the absurdity of the statement to imply that that ‘guns kill people’ must be false, even though ‘guns kill people’ uses the word kill to mean ‘increase the killing of’, not ‘consciously kill’.
Similarly, the phrase ‘AI is after your bank account’ implies that AI is consciously after your bank account. Something such as ‘AI usage increases fraud’ would instead clear up the ambiguity.
I hope that this makes sense.
1 user thanked author for this post.
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AskWoody PlusFebruary 24, 2023 at 7:08 am in reply to: Justice Kagan:“These are not like the nine greatest experts on the internet” #2536960Google indexes around 50 billion web pages.
Facebook has 17 billion posts and 10 billion messages every day.
There are 350 billion emails sent every day.
Wikipedia has over a billion edits.
YouTube has around a billion videos.
Just some examples.Do you really think that it’s practical to have a lawyer decide that each one of these web pages/posts/emails/etc. complies with every US law before it is published?
Do you really want to wait for a lawyer to review your email or transferred files before you can access them or send them?
And if you extend it to them being liable for data stored, as you have said, that would mean that the services would be liable as soon as something was uploaded to them, meaning that all of the above would be impossible to exist, as would any form of data uploading, since all it would take is one bad actor to upload an illegal message or file for the service to be at fault before the lawyer had even had a chance to review it.
1 user thanked author for this post.
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AskWoody PlusFebruary 23, 2023 at 11:49 pm in reply to: Justice Kagan:“These are not like the nine greatest experts on the internet” #2536912Don’t worry, Susan – without Section 230 search engines would theoretically be as good as illegal too, so no one would be able to find AskWoody to post on it!
We’d all just have to go to Wikipedia to find our answers… Oh wait…
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AskWoody PlusFebruary 23, 2023 at 1:58 pm in reply to: Justice Kagan:“These are not like the nine greatest experts on the internet” #2536823Personally, I’m not keen on the idea of everything from social media to forums to webmail to the cloud becoming as good as illegal overnight. Well, the social media part would be okay…
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AskWoody PlusSay goodbye to a dark night sky.
…the sky may brighten by a factor of two to three due to diffuse reflection of sunlight off the spacecraft…
https://www.space.com/megaconstellations-disruption-astronomy-like-light-pollution
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