Damnit I have a computer virus

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

My MacBook has a virus! I keep on getting pop up notifications in the top right corner of the screen saying you have a virus, click to delete it (yeah, right.)

I have installed Sophos and done a sweep but it hasn't picked up on anything. Looks like the next step will be buying Norton.

Damn.

 

[fla4fun]

My MacBook has a virus! I keep on getting pop up notifications in the top right corner of the screen saying you have a virus, click to delete it (yeah, right.)

I have installed Sophos and done a sweep but it hasn't picked up on anything. Looks like the next step will be buying Norton.

Damn.

It could also simply be a scam trying to get you to click on something hazardous. I give pop ups a side eye, especially on my Apple products. Do you have a good ad blocker on your Macbook?

 

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

It's not a web orientated pop-up, this is a system level pop-up, basically a warning. A warning about a warning. Hah.

 

[Lumpy1106]

I would not buy Norton. ESET is a much better choice.

 

[disneychrista]

It's not a web orientated pop-up, this is a system level pop-up, basically a warning. A warning about a warning. Hah.

If it is truly a system warning why are you afraid to click it?

 

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

If it is truly a system warning why are you afraid to click it?

Not only is it in bad English, it does not belong. I can't describe it. I just know it's out of place. And I'm a monkey's uncle if I'm going to give it access to my base OS.

 

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

This is one of three suspicious warnings...

 

[disneychrista]

That isn't a system message. It is a pop-up made to look like one. You are correct to not click it. Ignore it.

 

[sam_gordon]

But Macs don't get viruses.

 

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

But Macs don't get viruses.

lol!

Even RISCOS computers get viruses and they are built as system-on-chips.

 

[BrianL]

But Macs don't get viruses.

That used to be the case only because Mac had such a small share of the PC market that virus coders didn't tend to write them for Mac. I do not believe that is the case anymore. Even phones can get viruses!

 

[kdonnel]

But Macs don't get viruses.

There are much fewer malware in existence that targets MacOS.

https://www.macworld.com/article/672879/list-of-mac-viruses-malware-and-security-flaws.html

It’s a bit of security through obscurity.

If you want to steal from people and think you will have a small chance of succeeding, the wider the audience, the better your chances of success. So you target the OS with the larger installed base, Windows.

 

[dizneegirl]

I think it was sarcasm...

 

[kdonnel]

I think it was sarcasm...

I think everyone understood it was sarcasm.

I’m not sure most understand just how much less likely encountering malware occurs on a MacOS computer versus a Windows computer.

At the moment there is a great deal of truth buried in the sarcasm.

 

[sam_gordon]

I think everyone understood it was sarcasm.

I’m not sure most understand just how much less likely encountering malware occurs on a MacOS computer versus a Windows computer.

At the moment there is a great deal of truth buried in the sarcasm.

Yes, it was sarcasm.

FWIW, my family and I have worked with five laptops and a windows desktop over the last 5-10 years and have gotten ZERO viruses (knock on wood).

 

[dioxide45]

Do you have GMail? If you do, it it setup for push notification? It is possible this is just an email that you are getting into your spam or junk folder by GMail is pushing you a notification. Turn off notifications on Gmail and this goes away. This could just be a phishing type email.

 

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

Do you have GMail? If you do, it it setup for push notification? It is possible this is just an email that you are getting into your spam or junk folder by GMail is pushing you a notification. Turn off notifications on Gmail and this goes away. This could just be a phishing type email.

Annoyingly, I don't have Gmail!