Are you certain? If the Mac was running the same
network services as
that Unix box, I'd bet your chances of a problem are even -- if not
worse on the Mac, due to their popularity among "home users," which
unix isn't...
The wonderful bonus you have here with the Mac is... AppleTalk isn't
passed by home internet routers or modems. So you can safely have the
default settings of a home file/print sharing turned on on your Macs, and
no one outside of your home network will know it is there.
This changes if you turn on AppleTalk over IP, but since that is off by
default, you must explicitly set it when you turn on your filesharing. At
that point, if you don't know what you are activating, you deserve what
you get.
Also, even if I run servers/services that DO interact with the
internet... I am far less likely to be hacked simply by virtue of there
is almost no one trying to hack the Mac servers. That isn't true with
Windows and Unix where any 13yr old script kiddie can get tools to make
attempts.
I don't pretend that Mac internet servers are unhackable... just that
people aren't making easy tools to try, so the script kiddies ignore them.
Much like Mac users being "immune" to viruses. We are FAR from immune...
we just don't really see them because no one is interested in trying.
There are advantages to being a 5% market... small targets don't get hit
often.
(so how long now until someone hacks my web page to prove a point :-) )
-chris
<http://www.mythtech.net>