I had an interesting experience last week.

I had a word document that I had created and had been working on for a week or two.

I converted it to a pdf and sent it to someone using windows for their opinion and they sent back some suggestions for changes which I did.

I then converted to pdf again and sent to my business partner and co-director of BITTS who is using a Mac Book Air with no windows install.

He responded that his antivirus software had alerted him that there was a trojan virus attached.

Well that sparked off having me researching more on virus infection and the Mac and as a result I downloaded and installed iAntiVirus and ClamXAv.

The first run - ClamXAv -  found some infected emails in my junk mailbox that I had not opened as Mail had sent them straight to Junk, and of course I emptied my junk mail immediately.  It found no other infection, certainly none in the pdf I had emailed out, nor the actual email sitting in sent items.

The second run - iAntiVirus - found no infections.

In the meantime Les had all sorts of odd little things happening on his Mac and finally his antivirus declared he was clean.

So without any infection found in the pdf document and no infections apparently having been active on my Mac I simply sent him the file again.

No response from his antivirus this time!

What happened?

I’ve no idea and that’s the truth.

Whatever it was, it was a windows virus and not something that could affect the Mac, and I will take the plunge and say that I suspect that my partners antivirus was giving a false report as it is too odd that with no infections here and no one else reporting an infected mail out from me, that it was something on my machine.

But it is a timely reminder for me who was writing a column about Mac maintenance and the need to avoid becoming complacent about virus.  It’s weird sometimes how things like this can happen in an ironic fashion.

I used to keep Norton AV for Mac, but I decided not to continue when payment time came around and happened not to have installed any of the free programs when this all happened.

The main issue Mac users have is that they can ‘get’ a virus on their computer, but it can’t wreak it’s havoc or damage there, but it may be able to pass itself on to windows people you communicate with.  Then of course it can wreak it’s havoc.

Another common thing I hear said is: but if companies like Symantec make antivirus for Mac then it must be true that they can get infected, everyone else is lying to trick me.

Really all we are doing when we pay money for these programs is filtering out Windows virus threats so we don’t pass them back - a windows virus CANNOT infect and do harm to your Mac!

Below are a few links for you to investigate and think about what steps you might take for your own Mac.

Mac World article on buying a Mac

Digital Trends excellent article

Mac World article on Parrellels (the feature that lets you simultaneously use Windows and Leopard)

Mac World article on Mac Antivirus

Nortons AV for Mac

Avast for Mac and PC

Tid bits article

I do hope all this helps to dispel some of the myths and assist you to choose what path you should take with your Mac

Use of the Mac is becoming increasingly popular with the latest figures showing usage at 16%. The change over to the Intel chip last year has possibly been partly responsible for this rise as you can boot into Windows as well as into Leopard.
The price has also come down significantly so that you can purchase a Mac system for a similar price to a PC.
All computers need maintenance regularly and the tasks don’t vary greatly from a windows machine except that the Mac defragments itself without the user needing to do anything.
The main thing a Mac user needs to do is run software updates automatically and the system will run optimally.
Maintenance the user can do for their system includes:
Keep files named clearly and stored in folders so they are easy to manage.  Please note that if you use iPhoto to manage your photos, only rename them from iPhoto rather than from the finder.
If your disk is getting full you can archive files that you don’t need but want to keep.  This creates a small zip file containing your files.
Backing up is as important when using a Mac as any other system.
Leopard has an impressive backup feature called Time Machine that manages your backups for you and makes finding items in the backup a snap.  I have my Mac backing up every hour when I am working on important jobs.
Now the Mac is far less likely to get a virus, unlike Windows, but that doesn’t mean it is impossible.  In fact many Mac owners will run Anti Virus software mostly to ensure they don’t pass Windows viruses on that were unable to affect the Mac.  Still Mac users should beware of becoming complacent.