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[Alastar]

I'd prefer skirting around a cesspool of malware to swimming through it quickly.
Individuals can afford to neglect security, but if everyone does the whole ecosystem turns into a cesspool (if you remember the days of pre-NT windows... being connected to the net was a scary thing back then. Classic Mac Os was even more shockingly naive in some ways).

Linux approaches security like a traditional Unix, applying security practices adequate for big systems with thousands of users. The method may seem bureaucratic and the defaults excessive for a single-user system that's never left unattended, but you have fine-grained control over authentication through a single well-commented text file (sudoers).

[Leatra]

I'd rather leave security to an anti-virus rather than Microsoft.

[Tellemurius]

never used a antivirus on this computer for about a year now and had no infections, even with all the stupid crap i do.

[GlyphGryph]

I'd rather leave security to an anti-virus rather than Microsoft.

The Microsoft antivirus is actually one of the best on the market right now, if not THE best.

[Tellemurius]

I'd rather leave security to an anti-virus rather than Microsoft.

The Microsoft antivirus is actually one of the best on the market right now, if not THE best.

It is indeed, less of a resource hog than AVG and complains alot less

[MaximumZero]

I'm mostly posting to watch, as I'm interested in the discussion at hand. Please disregard this post.

Ah, you're just like glyph, waiting to see how I fail

Nah. I'm mostly interested in the Win8 hate. Honestly, from what I've seen, it's a slightly lighter version of Win7 with a new overlay. *shrug*

[Thief^]

never used a antivirus on this computer for about a year now and had no infections, even with all the stupid crap i do.

Just keystealers, spam email relays and trojans hiding on your pc then?
(not all malware damages your pc)

[Tellemurius]

never used a antivirus on this computer for about a year now and had no infections, even with all the stupid crap i do.

Just keystealers, spam email relays and trojans hiding on your pc then?
(not all malware damages your pc)

well no, i may run malwarebytes once in a while and peek through exe's but i never been infected with this machine.

[Thief^]

You keep telling yourself that. Personally I wouldn't dare connect a pc to the internet without a realtime AV running.

[Tellemurius]

You keep telling yourself that. Personally I wouldn't dare connect a pc to the internet without a realtime AV running.

as a computer tech i know what i am doing, which vectors are currently volatile, everything is updated fully, UAC is still on (yea i have it on, sue me), still pirate, still flying by.

[Siquo]

You keep telling yourself that. Personally I wouldn't dare connect a pc to the internet without a realtime AV running.

as a computer tech i know what i am doing, which vectors are currently volatile, everything is updated fully, UAC is still on (yea i have it on, sue me), still pirate, still flying by.

Indeed. Having a decent firewall works, too. Any process trying to connect to the internet needs to go past me first, because I can't really see the difference between DRM and malware. Real-time AV are a waste of processor power. You only need to check the new stuff that you download, and have a decent firewall to block the rest.

[Thief^]

So you visit a website, and one of the ads triggers a drive-by vulnerability in your browser and installs a plugin which watches for when you use your online banking and then sends your details abroad via your browser (which isn't blocked in your firewall, obviously).
EDIT: blocking ads helps but is by no means 100% effective, especially on dodgier websites...

How would you know unless you manually ran antimalware before every online banking session?

That's just an example, it applies equally to world of warcraft accounts (e.g. sends your account login via in-game pm) or your email details (via email!) or your PayPal details or anything else.

The key is the window of opportunity you have to clear the infection before it finds what it's looking for. A realtime AV is much more likely to catch it in time than manually running only when you remember...

[Siquo]

The key is the window of opportunity you have to clear the infection before it finds what it's looking for. A realtime AV is much more likely to catch it in time than manually running only when you remember...

Possible, but I don't really trust my browser, for that reason. Banking man-in-the-middle is virtually impossible (as I use an obscure bank with a hardware token), and all scripts need to pass my noScript. I suppose your scenario is possible, but there's no such thing as 100% safety. There's just a level of "acceptable risk", and being paranoid, I've already decided that all data on my computer is already public knowledge, and I treat it as such.

[Thief^]

I don't understand your logic. You claim to be paranoid, yet you don't run antivirus. Surely the paranoid thing to do would be to run the best AV you could?

EDIT: Good for you for having a hardware token for banking, but you can't have a hardware token for every login you care about, because very few services support them. That's why I gave a few other examples as well as banking.

[Siquo]

No. Security is not in absolutes, it's about choosing a shade of grey, and making a choice between risk and utility. If someone finds out the color of my hair, that is less important than finding out my phone number, which is less important than finding out my SSN. I just don't keep sensitive data on my gaming-rig If I want secure I wouldn't be using Windows in the first place