Wednesday, April 01, 2009

I don't know why Macs are less vulnerable to computer viruses.

Earlier today I deleted a bunch of spam comments to one of this week's blog posts, which I assume were sent by a computer infected with the Conficker virus. Annoying, but no big deal.

All of the warnings about Conficker have been directed to PC owners, which I assume means that Macs aren't vulnerable. People have told me that this is because Macs are too small a percentage of the computer world to target, but I don't really understand this, and I'm not even sure it's true. Also, are the operating systems really so different that PC viruses don't work on Macs? Can anyone explain this to me?

It's a rainy day, I'm behind on my work and feeling discouraged about a lot of different things. Waiting to hear from the vet about the schedule for Dizzy's stem-cell procedure, which we're going ahead with.

Five Random Songs

"Old Friends," Simon and Garfunkel. "Can you imagine us years from today/Sharing a park bench quietly?" Some days, I wouldn't mind just skipping ahead those 30 years.

"Entr'Acte," from Chicago. This show is still touring -- I saw a bus placard for it here in DC the other day.

"You Won't Have to Cry," The Byrds. A sound that has never been recreated.

"What a Piece of Work is Man," from the Hair soundtrack. An all-1960s soundtrack this morning...

"Don't Go," Matthew Sweet. Not 1960s, but it could be; in fact, it's a very Byrds-style sound.

1 comment:

Bea said...

Yes. Conficker specifically targets a vulnerability in Windows. Think of it as an unlocked door accidentally left in the Windows code. It's been fixed, but not everyone downloads updates and many computers were infected before the fix.