Windows Vista and Malware Immunity

At the beginning of May, security company PC Tools revealed that Windows Vista “is not so immune.” And in this attempt to wrap the obvious together with statistics from a limited pool of users and serve the result as a revelation, the security outfit went on to claim that “Windows Vista is more susceptible to malware than the eight year old Windows 2000 operating system, and only 37% more secure than Windows XP”. Apparently, PC Tolls had detected 639 unique threats per 1,000 Vista machines, in comparison to just 586 for Windows 2000, 478 for Windows Server 2003, and 1,021 for XP. The conclusion is, of course, nothing short of obvious and was stated as clear as possible, with a challenge to Vista’s malware immunity.

Now, the fact is that citing data from over 450 million computers, in respect to PC Tools’ just 1.4 million machines, Microsoft disputed the findings, and continued to claim that Windows Vista is the safest Windows operating system on the market. Microsoft has repeated this refrain since Vista was launched, and provided ample proof, from the data collected through the Malicious Software Removal Tool to vulnerability counting games involving the main platforms.

But one thing that Microsoft has never done is claim that Windows Vista is immune to malware. In this regard, the position of Simon Clausen, Chief Executive Officer - PC Tools, is expressed through the following: “Vista is not immune from online threats. Further research and analysis has confirmed our contention that additional third-party protection is absolutely necessary for all Windows Vista users”.

Since the advent of Windows Vista, the Redmond company has urged users to follow a set of best practices in terms of security from enabling the User Account Control, to not executing email attachments in messages from untrusted sources, and to running antivirus software. Vista is not and will never be immune to malicious code, neither will Vista Service Pack 1, Windows 7 or any other Windows operating system. As a matter of fact, all silver bullet solutions for security are nothing more than myths…