Apple plugs 25 Mac OS X flaws

http://news.zdnet.com:80/2100-1009_22-6177758.html

Apple on Thursday issued a security update for Mac OS X that addresses 25 security flaws in the operating system software.

The security update affects various parts of the operating system, including some third-party components such as the Kerberos authentication technology. The most serious of the vulnerabilities could allow an attacker to gain complete control over an unpatched Mac, Apple said in a security advisory.

The update deals with another trio of zero-day bugs that were disclosed as part of the Month of Apple Bugs in January. Apple has quashed many bugs detailed during the Month of Apple Bugs and Month of Kernel Bugs projects in previous patch releases.

I tend to stay out of that forum and ask people with Mac tech questions to go over there as it's their own forum.

General news like this and placed in general forums, however, I have no qualms responding to with my usual "talking points". :)

You keep posting these warnings about oS X, how insecure it started out and how insecure it remains in spite of all the updates.

In point of fact, these exploits were secured several weeks ago in the last update. You might try to keep up to date while you bash apple.

Meanwhile, my iMac has been open to the inet for a couple of years now, with no ill effects, no virii, trojans, etc. Try doing that with a Windblows machine.

I was virus-free for YEARS.

Fortunately it was a benign malady; incorporated into the "Vista Transformation Pack" freeware GUI augmenter...

Case in point, viruses aren't all about what can sneak through your firewall and unpatched code. And more Mac software will be of the tempting "Use me!" variety, of which no human is ultimately immune.

I also have a lot against apple, in chronological order:

* Doing unto Xerox what Microsoft later did to Apple (essentially the same thing. Funny who had lost and who had won...)
* The original Mac, the "Lisa", was underpowered considering it's $10,000 selling price (Apple always overprices)
* Selling the original mac with no keyboard (a $200 value, and then or now a keyboard is ESSENTIAL)
* removing SCSI architecture
* Leeching off of open source (99% of OS X came from freeware - FreeBSD; how do the programmers feel about having their code hijacked for corporate gain?)
* Constantly hyping up Motorola CPU architecture until the day they release Intel-based processors; after which it's "all Intel, all the time". That quick of a difference? No doubt; FreeBSD started on Intel hardware and was ported to their G4 architecture...
* More on Intel, they're obviously into TPM as they don't want real PCs to run "Mac OS" on them. Apple has a special chip that looks at OS install code - OS X won't install and extra software has to be installed to enable the thing to run Windows. (plus, given the price of their systems, one is still better off buyin' a normal PC if they want to run Windows on it.)
* Adobe opts to stop supporting their "Premiere" video editing application on the Mac. (How long before Photoshop follows suit?) That's a kick in Apple's proverbial teeth.
* Claiming to offer monitor compatibility with PCs (to ostensibly warm us up to migrating to macs) but not installing even a basic Windows driver so Windows knows "how" to display information on it. Don't tell me it's the same for Macs; hardware vendors do offer mac drivers with basic functionality.
* While HP and others (even Dell, eek!) have recycling and buy-back programs ("green" environmentalism), Apple got into this area rather late in the game - www.badapple.biz states of a consumer-led complaint against Apple that got them running. Considering just who has been on Apple's board since 2003, and reading their latest updates, you're too right I'm upset.
* I recently found out iTunes' music format is 128kbps. For the price people pay (on par with the cost of one song on one CD when all is said and done), it should be 384kpbs (so I'll just stick to CDs for now on). It's better than MP3 format, but it's still a raw deal. Until then, I was a supporter of iTunes for their generous DRM policies. Nice to know Steve Jobs is now trying to get rid of DRM from the music labels; can't wait to hear if that extends to songs people have already bought.
* (Added in an edit) - forgot to mention; Steve Jobs recently lashed out against school teachers. Because he thinks there's a concern (don't forget, he offshores) or because school systems stopped putting in big contracts for his computers (as nobody uses them in the business world)?
* More recently, http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9584_22-6173345.html also criticizes Apple's lack of "green"-ness

Apple is just a business. That sells tools. Like everybody else. I find reasons to bash everyone; but something about Apple is doubly insulting. Maybe it's their slogans: "A computer for the rest of us", "think different", and so on. I'll just think and make my own mistakes instead of being told to parrot somebody else and hear a great excuse when they make mistakes. Does Apple admit mistakes, or do they wait for consumer-led activities - again, such as the likes of http://www.badapple.biz?

I'll give them credit for surviving this long (especially when Microsoft was suffocating everybody else); but their survival has mostly come in the form of taking the power out of their machines, pandering to the shallow (the imac's colorful cases), and later via glorified portable media players such as the ipod (my PDA with 8GB RAM works just as well and does far more for the money, thank you anyway... pity the Zune won't do PDA functions...)

Windows is grossly less than perfect, but the blind arrogance of the feebs ranting "Mac is bulletproof, rah rah rah!" literally beg for hackers to prove them wrong.

And, guess what, Windows users are slightly more secure in the end - we've been conditioned to using antivirus software. Mac users (old school macs or FreeBSD-based OS X) haven't. That plus common sense with hardware and standard security practices we ought to use... Apple's known for not wanting people to think. They call it "A computer for the rest of us" or "think different". Pity.

Besides, the corporate politics of that company are no better than Microsoft's. Plus, Macs cost more.