as has been said, you are probably not the source. there are few mac viruses, but there have been some, and at least one (the "autostart" virus/worm) have done significant damage. likely there will be more eventually. for antivirus software, i recommend sophos.com, you can download a free demo (which actually doesn't expire, though i'd encourage any business user to pay for it, it is one of the more expensive packages). one of the neat features of the sophos product is the ability to scan for mac and pc/windows viruses on both the mac and pc platforms. i've found it to be an excellent and quick scanner with frequent updates covering new viruses. despite what some say, i strongly recommend having good antivirus software and a good firewall, most people will not need them, those who do face an attack will however be very happy they had some protection, and incursion attempts are increasing rapidly. note also that some attacks are fairly independent of the os, the mac os does have a significant number of holes (as does any os), and some attacks are specifically aimed at hardware firewalls (i've seen a lot of attacks targeted at firewall/router boxes lately) in which case it doesn't matter what os you are running, if the firewall box is compromised there's no need to crack the os to monitor data and collect information. oddly enough, there is a glut of stolen credit card information, so much so that most stolen data is never actually used!
most likely, the viruses that claim to be coming from your system, are infecting systems of people you know who use outhouse or other virus friendly software which reads their address book and claims to be from people in that book and also frequently tries to infect those people. note that spammers are also cracking address books to find email addresses to spam and even taking over ordinary machines and using them and their internet accounts to send spam, for distributed denial of service attacks, etc. the best thing you can do is to make your pc and microsoft using friends more aware and encourage them to run proper firewalls and antivirus software. the real problem is the large number of casual users who don't think they have a problem until it's made painfully obvious and who's machines may be greatly contributing to the problem with out any indication that there is a problem. as is usually the case, it's about education and attitude, and bothering to take the simple steps that stop most of the problems. Karen Turner wrote: ------ > I just joined this list. I have a 9600/300 running a G3. I need some > form of anti-virus software, but have no idea what to get. > --------- > > I have been online to look for downloadable free anti-virus software, > but have had no luck. There is tons of stuff for a PC, but I can't > find anything for my Mac. I'd really like to take care of this > problem. I am running TechTool, but cannot run Norton as it causes > too many glitches with my Netscape. ------- -- G-List is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... Small Dog Electronics http://www.smalldog.com | Refurbished Drives | -- We have Apple Refurbished Monitors in stock! | & CDRWs on Sale! | Support Low End Mac <http://lowendmac.com/lists/support.html> G-List list info: <http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml> --> AOL users, remove "mailto:"; Send list messages to: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For digest mode, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subscription questions: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/g-list%40mail.maclaunch.com/> Using a Mac? Free email & more at Applelinks! http://www.applelinks.com
