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You're totally right, that market share argument is often vague and probably unfalsifiable, but there's at least a clear logic to it. "It hasn't happened yet,"

You're totally right, that market share argument is often vague and probably unfalsifiable, but there's at least a clear logic to it. "It hasn't happened yet," on the other hand, is not an argument at all. An analysis charting data of total malware vs. market share would be more interesting, but an argument for why it hasn't happened yet, and will continue not to would be the most interesting to me. I'm not sure I follow your last point.

bediger 15y ago
I don't know that the "market share" argument is unfalsifyable. The Witty Worm of 2004 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witty_(computer_worm) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witty_(computer_worm)) attacked a particular vendor's firewall implementation. It seems to have infected every one of the 12,000 members of the susceptible population. That's a pretty small market share, even in the firewall market, even in 2004. The Witty Worm seems like a good counter-example of the "market share" argument. As for full disclosure, I personally regard the "market share" argument as a form of the Special Pleading logical fallacy.
- wtallis 15y ago
  The Witty Worm could be explained by those firewalls being considered far more valuable or vulnerable targets than desktop PCs. The market share argument typically assumes that those factors are roughly the same for Macs and Windows machines, and that the only significant difference (or at least, the dominant factor) is the size of the target population.
wtallis 15y ago
The market share argument implicitly rejects the idea that OS X is significantly more secure than Windows, by saying that when OS X gets more popular, the amount of malware for OS X will catch up and be more comparable to the amount of Windows malware. It postulates that there must be some threshold level of market share that Macs must exceed before this happens. The current fact that Mac malware is still rare puts a lower bound on that threshold. Whatever that number is, it is larger than the current Mac market share. It is also safe to assume that 50% is an upper bound on that threshold. If you assume that OS X is not only as insecure as Windows, but significantly less secure than Windows, then the threshold should be lower, because fewer Macs should be needed to reach the same level of successful attacks. If an attack on Windows is twice as hard as an attack on OS X, then OS X should only need 33% market share in order to reach malware-volume parity. Every advance in Windows security that is not matched by Apple, and every increase in Mac market share, narrows the conditions under which the market share argument can be considered true, and narrows the range of predictions that can be made in accordance with that theory. While there is not enough evidence to totally reject the market share argument, we do not have the crucial evidence necessary to prove it true, and all the evidence that has been accumulating over the past decade counts against it.
- joebadmo 15y ago
  I agree that nothing about the market share argument has been proven, true or false. The evidence only shows that the market share argument is false or that we simply haven't reached the threshold yet. But: "The market share argument implicitly rejects the idea that OS X is significantly more secure than Windows..." This is the idea I'm curious about. Perhaps there are arguments that make the case that OS X is signicantly (and inherently) more secure than Windows that I've missed, and if that's the case, I'd appreciate someone directing me at them. If the market share argument is false, which I grant that it very well could be, I'm interested in the reasons that might be so. Inherent security of OS X could be one reason. Another could be something specific to do with malware that I don't know or understand because I'm not that familiar with the subject. I'm saying I understand the market share argument, and it seems straightforward and logical. I have not seen a counter-argument, but if there is one, I'd like to see it. Gruber does not produce a counter-argument. I'm not asking for evidence either way, because I don't think there is any yet. I'm asking for an argument.
  - wtallis 15y ago
    I'm not saying the market share argument is illogical. I'm saying it's not likely to be true. The extent to which that can be proven is limited by the lack of specific predictions to be falsified. At the moment, all I can say is that a significant fraction of the predictions that could have been made a decade ago have been falsified. For example, the Mac malware explosion has not happened yet, and Mac market share is around 10%, so we can conclude that Macs aren't 10 times easier to attack than Windows targets. If Mac market share is more like 15%, then Macs can't be much more than 5 times easier to attack.

bediger 15y ago

I don't know that the "market share" argument is unfalsifyable. The Witty Worm of 2004 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witty_(computer_worm) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witty_(computer_worm)) attacked a particular vendor's firewall implementation. It seems to have infected every one of the 12,000 members of the susceptible population. That's a pretty small market share, even in the firewall market, even in 2004. The Witty Worm seems like a good counter-example of the "market share" argument. As for full disclosure, I personally regard the "market share" argument as a form of the Special Pleading logical fallacy.

wtallis 15y ago
The Witty Worm could be explained by those firewalls being considered far more valuable or vulnerable targets than desktop PCs. The market share argument typically assumes that those factors are roughly the same for Macs and Windows machines, and that the only significant difference (or at least, the dominant factor) is the size of the target population.

wtallis 15y ago

The market share argument implicitly rejects the idea that OS X is significantly more secure than Windows, by saying that when OS X gets more popular, the amount of malware for OS X will catch up and be more comparable to the amount of Windows malware. It postulates that there must be some threshold level of market share that Macs must exceed before this happens. The current fact that Mac malware is still rare puts a lower bound on that threshold. Whatever that number is, it is larger than the current Mac market share. It is also safe to assume that 50% is an upper bound on that threshold. If you assume that OS X is not only as insecure as Windows, but significantly less secure than Windows, then the threshold should be lower, because fewer Macs should be needed to reach the same level of successful attacks. If an attack on Windows is twice as hard as an attack on OS X, then OS X should only need 33% market share in order to reach malware-volume parity. Every advance in Windows security that is not matched by Apple, and every increase in Mac market share, narrows the conditions under which the market share argument can be considered true, and narrows the range of predictions that can be made in accordance with that theory. While there is not enough evidence to totally reject the market share argument, we do not have the crucial evidence necessary to prove it true, and all the evidence that has been accumulating over the past decade counts against it.

joebadmo 15y ago
I agree that nothing about the market share argument has been proven, true or false. The evidence only shows that the market share argument is false or that we simply haven't reached the threshold yet. But: "The market share argument implicitly rejects the idea that OS X is significantly more secure than Windows..." This is the idea I'm curious about. Perhaps there are arguments that make the case that OS X is signicantly (and inherently) more secure than Windows that I've missed, and if that's the case, I'd appreciate someone directing me at them. If the market share argument is false, which I grant that it very well could be, I'm interested in the reasons that might be so. Inherent security of OS X could be one reason. Another could be something specific to do with malware that I don't know or understand because I'm not that familiar with the subject. I'm saying I understand the market share argument, and it seems straightforward and logical. I have not seen a counter-argument, but if there is one, I'd like to see it. Gruber does not produce a counter-argument. I'm not asking for evidence either way, because I don't think there is any yet. I'm asking for an argument.
- wtallis 15y ago
  I'm not saying the market share argument is illogical. I'm saying it's not likely to be true. The extent to which that can be proven is limited by the lack of specific predictions to be falsified. At the moment, all I can say is that a significant fraction of the predictions that could have been made a decade ago have been falsified. For example, the Mac malware explosion has not happened yet, and Mac market share is around 10%, so we can conclude that Macs aren't 10 times easier to attack than Windows targets. If Mac market share is more like 15%, then Macs can't be much more than 5 times easier to attack.