Mac users of the world: wipe the smug look of your faces, because it turns out that Windows in more secure than Mac OSX according to a report from Symantec.
InternetNews.com quotes the report as following:
The report found that Microsoft Windows had the fewest number of patches and the shortest average patch development time of the five operating systems it monitored in the last six months of 2006.
During this period, 39 vulnerabilities, 12 of which were ranked high priority or severe, were found in Microsoft Windows and the company took an average of 21 days to fix them. It’s an increase of the 22 vulnerabilities and 13-day turnaround time for the first half of 2006 but still bested the competition handily….Then there’s Mac OS X. Despite the latest TV ads ridiculing the security in Vista with a Matrix-like Agent playing the UAC in Vista, Apple has nothing to brag about. Symantec found 43 vulnerabilities in Mac OS X and a 66 day turnaround on fixes.
That’s 39 v 44, with a 3x better turn around with patches Microsoft v Apple. I wonder if Microsoft will sue Apple for false advertising?
Originally posted on March 22, 2007 @ 6:45 pm
Right! And now i a want to use OutLook again.
You make some excellent points and I’m glad that you’re pointing out to Mac users that OS/X has plenty of security problems (they need to hear this for their own good). However, your post’s lack of emphasis in the area of severe security vulnerabilities is problematic.
Security people will point out that the first priority is to avoid and then fix the high security threats – the ones that will cause great harm to their users. I’m glad to see Microsoft is doing better than Apple in the area of overall number of bugs and that they’re responding to those problems more quickly than Apple or other competitors. Great! But Apple had 1 severe problem to Microsoft’s 12… And for this you declare Microsoft a winner?
If I were Symantec, complete with a vague idea of where my market is, I’d push Windows over Mac even harder than this ;-)