Norton AntiVirus 11, Time Machine, and Time Capsule

J Taylor wrote:
When Time Machine starts Norton AntiVirus begins a scan of all 700k+ files on my Time Capsule. I cancel the scan but wonder if I am doing the right thing?

Yes, it would be better to uninstall the application. There are no viruses that attack Mac OS X and when there is one, it will be front page news and you can re-install it then, if ever.



-mj

Message was edited by: macjack

Norton is not very good even on PCs (I have it on two of my PCs and their 360 product is the worst thing I have ever used.
Norton is also not needed on a Mac, as another poster has noted. I have been running Macs "barefoot" since 2004 and have never been attacked or even threatened.
A router or WiFi with NAT is all I have and all that is needed.
Uninstall the Norton SW and enjoy 🙂

Hello j:

I rarely do "me too" posts, but in this case let me echo others. DUMP the Norton software - it is well documented that Norton program have caused many problems on Macs.

This knowledge base article has more information:

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1516

There are NO documented viruses that affect a Mac running OS X - NONE.

Barry

Hi all.

Agree, agree... and agree. Dump NAV.

I initially installed NAV and specifically set NAV not to scan my Time Machine external hard drive, and yet NAV still scan it... or rather, there was definitely activity there for my external drive kept spinning (with sound and stuffs) even when it was supposed to be idling.

When I totally removed all traces of NAV, the hard disk activity stopped and only does so when Time Machine is doing its work

Cheers

You might do well to include a line like, 'but be vigilant and careful,..........yadda yadda, yadda'.

I have a feeling the average Mac user isn't as careful as they could be. Sooner or later we're gonna get a fright.

Hi gumsie, I can include much more than a line about being vigilant.

While there are no known viruses that attack Mac OS X at the present time, it is possible for spyware to get onto your Mac.

So I go to lenghts to protect my user. A hosed system can be replaced but a compromised user folder is compromised forever. Along with all your important data like bank records, credit cards, ... I.e. your "identity" stolen.

The best way to avoid that is by using your built-in firewall which is industrial strength and/or a hard wired router, downloading only from "trusted" sites, installing all security updates and being careful about what you give administrative power to. It is also recommended to run day to day tasks from a non-admin account.

Don't use Limewire or any other P2P service to download your software, get it from reputable sources. In addition, always keep at least your users backed up, preferably a clone of your entire system on a separate disk. And put your sensitive passwords, bank accounts, credit card numbers in a "secure note" in a new keychain or in an encrypted folder.

If and when a Mac virus does appear it will be headline news and you can download the AV software then. If you feel you have to run an AV program I'd suggest ClamXav a mac friendly freeware app that is very stable with Tiger. It will check for known virus signatures at any rate.

Hope this allays your fears;-)



-mj

I think there's a point which is being missed regarding viruses on Macs, and that is that while we believe there are no viruses which directly affect Macs, Macro viruses which may be contained in MS Office applications could have an effect. Also, without anti-virus software on the Mac, the Mac can become a carrier for PC viruses which might be embedded in imported or downloaded files from PC users, These can then be passed on to other Mac and PC users if infected files are sent on. Once they are back in a Windows environment, they can then have their intended effect.

The solution is to install anti-virus software on the Mac which also detects PC and Macro viruses - I use Intego Virus Barrier X5 for this reason (BTW, version X4 does NOT deal with PC viruses), and recently I found a setup.exe file on my Mac which was infected with a PC virus. I had inadvertently downloaded a Windows version of a utility in mistake for a Mac version. Rather than repair the infected file, I deleted it and did a Secure Empty Trash to actually remove it from my hard disk rather than merely delete its pointer.

So yes, the Mac may be immune but it can act as a carrier, so please give consideration to other users and do not run without suitable anti-virus software.

Hi,

I have Norton AntiVirus 11, and I like its feature of scanning external drives as I connect them, since it's a good protection against transmitting viruses amongst machines (I have both Macs and Windows machines in my home, and I also do on-site computer servicing, so I occasionally copy files to and from customers' machines). As long as your machine was protected by Norton Antivirus during the entire time you've been using Time Machine, it's pretty safe to assume that your Time Machine backups don't contain any viruses, so it's fine to cancel the Norton scan. When I use a flash drive to copy files back and forth between machines, I cancel the Norton scan after the first scan of the day, as I know that there's nothing bad there. Regarding the many reports of anti-Norton posters here, I've aware of problems with earlier versions of Norton AntiVirus for the Mac, but I've had no problems at all with versions 10 and 11 of this product.

Hope this helps,

Ken

Yes, that's true. But .exe files are not executable on Mac. Anyone who is running a Windows box with no virus protection will not be running for long and probably deserves whatever they get 😉

In new Office Versions "VBscript" is not present which, as I understand it, was the scripting language used by Macros.



-mj

Well, perhaps I should have said new Mac users. I just get the feeling that the 'No viruses for Mac' line has a limited life and that new users think their system is impregnable because there seems to be more about the lack of viruses than there is about increasing security and being careful.

I 've been having problems using time capsule to backup my G5 , it only did the initial backup and then I keep getting a time machine error every time , so I was told to turn off the "realtime antivirus scanning" that comes with G5's? Any idea how to do that ? Or any idea why it won't back up the computer? Thanks for the help 😉