Blogcritics Comments on Apple Weathers A Minor Storm

Comment by Phillip Winn

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 10:11:25 EST

Fair enough. I hadn't realized the extent of the emailer's stupidity at that point, and was probably reacting to him/her. My subsequent comments more reflect my views.

Comment by Dave

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 09:51:26 EST

While I agree that this post is very even-handed Phillip, your first comment simply wasn't. Rather, it IS a bit alarmist. I mean, in a reply to a direct question about product announcements around April 1... you chose that exact moment to say: "In general, I think that Apple has a lot to worry about security-wise, and if they don't resolve it, their 30th anniversary might just be met with a world full of hacked Macs" Hmmmm... we're talking about 18 days here. And somehow the world will be full of hacked Macs. Just a wee bit over-the-top, wouldn't you say? Sure, security is a concern. But to blurt out a non-responsive answer like this really does take away from what was a very good post.

Comment by Phillip Winn

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 08:57:24 EST

Not one has; that doesn't mean not one has been able to. It's funny, but I'm receiving emails from a nearly-incoherent name-caller who is claiming I haven't been hard enough on Apple, while in the comments here I'm reading someone who ignores reality in favor of inane sollipsism. Sanity, I'm sure, lies somewhere in between.

Comment by Poster

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 08:46:59 EST

"All it takes is one bored teenager..." And in a world of what, 2 billion people, not a single bored, frustrated, angsty teenager has been able to summon the few hours necessary to compromise OS X? Not one? And the antivirus guys are just sitting on the sidelines, generating more light than heat? And Apple releases a product that can be hacked in six hours flat, knowing that it can be? Uhm, please spare me the hysterics. You can choose to live in a world where the sky is perpetually falling, but that isn't reality. Get off the FUD; stop drinking the Kool Aid; and for goodness' sake, stop buying into the "mean world" hypothesis that the media feeds you to keep you nervously lapping up their communiques!

Comment by Mark Bellinghaus

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 02:54:24 EST

Great article, very informative and telling! I got one of those i-pods about two years ago, the ones were the battery was defect; I missed out on an exchange. Two years in that market is anchient! I am still amazed how they work, but if I wait a bit longer, maybe it will also drive me around or automatically will answer all my blog comments for me? Who knows what the future has in store. At times it is also pretty scary...! The future I mean.

Comment by Phillip Winn

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 02:26:26 EST

Yes, and basically I'm torn. I reported the facts as objectively as I could manage, trying to avoid either extreme: Yes, Don (#6) is correct: there isn't a widespread problem where hordes of Macs are requiring OS reinstalls. That remains the mein of Windows. The percentage of net-connected computers that run OS X is small enough that it seems too tedious to check random IP addresses looking for a Mac with services enabled (which they are not by default) and an un-passworded account. That said, there are several tools out there that try all sorts of test on every IP, and it wouldn't take long to add a few tests to identify and attack Macs, and Apple hasn't responded well enough to that possibility. So I guess my view is that Apple is screwing around, but they'll probably get away with it, because OS X just isn't as easy or valuable a target as Windows. Sigh. P.S. I'm composing this comment on an iMac.

Comment by Dave Nalle

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 02:13:01 EST

In my experience most Mac users just don't bother to use most of the security features the OS offers them. And I know teens who are happily hacking into OSX machines all the time, though not particularly maliciously. Because the Mac community is smaller there's less of a truly vicious element and a lot fewer people doing the hacking. Macs tend to attract a crowd with somewhat different interests, I think. Dave

Comment by Phillip Winn

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 02:08:25 EST

There are several moments between when a gun is fired at a person's head and when that bullet shatters the person's skull. During that time, do we not bother to pay attention? Because after all, so far, no bullet has hit my skull yet! Apple has long billed themselves as uncrackable, and prior to OS X, it was essentially true. Since the advent of OS X, they've been coasting by on the general perception that Macs were uncrackable, but have made several mistakes that are now coming to light. I've seen the proofs of concept. All it takes is one -- ONE! -- bored teenager with access to a Mac, and the myth of OS X's uncrackability will be history. In other words, the only reason Macs "in the wild" haven't been compromised yet is because nobody cares. It certainly has nothing to do with Apple's poor attention to security.

Comment by Don

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 01:45:45 EST

"In addition to the real security problems" Huh? What security problems? As far as I know, outside of the laboratory, no Mac OS X machine has yet been compromised by malware. Wake me up when it happens...

Comment by Phillip Winn

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 01:12:28 EST

In general, I think that Apple has a lot to worry about security-wise, and if they don't resolve it, their 30th anniversary might just be met with a world full of hacked Macs. Other than that, I stay out of the prediction business! :-)

Comment by Mark Sahm

Sun, 12 Mar 2006 23:04:01 EST

Phillip, what's your opinion on how Jobs will handle Apple's 30 year anniversary on April 1st? A lot of folks seem to think a full-screen Video iPod will be debuted, with the control wheel built in as part of the touch screen. I have my doubts though. Here's an amusing hoax pic that's been circulating of it, and a even better video short on how a fake one was made.

Comment by Eric Olsen

Sun, 12 Mar 2006 12:41:45 EST

very nice Phillip, thanks!

Comment by vikk

Sun, 12 Mar 2006 12:04:42 EST

Interesting roundup. Thanks!

Comment by Brian

Sun, 12 Mar 2006 11:25:58 EST

Finally an even-handed review of what's been going on in the world of Apple for the last couple of weeks. Bravo!