ITS Tech Tips: Mac Tips

Protecting against viruses on the Mac

Your Macintosh is NOT invulnerable to computer viruses. Although few and far between, viruses do occasionally infect Macs. Viruses today are generally designed for the PC and are often spread via e-mails with attachments. Although Macs may not be able to open these attachments, they can still pass the virus on to PC users. All new Macs have the Norton Antivirus software installed on them. If yours does not, please visit the software request form or call April Street at x2006 to order a copy.

When new viruses come out, Norton adds them to an ever-growing list called "virus definitions". If this list is up to date, Norton then knows how to deal with the virus should it infect your computer. You'll want to make sure your virus definition list is up to date; you can do this manually or have Norton check for updates automatically. After the definition list is up to date, you'll want to run a scan of your computer to make sure its clean. See instructions below.

• Update virus definitions manually
• Have Norton check for updates
• Run a scan

Update virus definitions manually

• Open your Finder window
• Go to the Applications folder, then Norton Solutions (it may say Symantec Solutions instead) .
• Double-click on the Live Update icon.

• Click on the Update Everything Now button.

Norton will check the home site at www.symantec.com for any necessary updates and install them. A summary window will appear when the update is complete. A restart of your computer may be necessary and you will be prompted if that is the case.

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Have Norton check for updates

Norton can be customized to check for updates regularly.

• Open the Live Update screen as you did in the steps above.
• Click on Symantec Scheduler.

• Click on the New... button
• Select Product Update on the screen that appears.

• Give your task a name (or accept the default text).
• Choose what you want updated (All Products would be good).
• Set the frequency.
• Pick the date the task will run.
• Set the time the task will run.
• Click Save.
• Exit Norton.

Note: When setting up a schedule such as above, you'll need to make sure your computer is ON when the task is set to run.

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Run a scan

To have Norton scan your hard drive for viruses,

• Navigate to the same Norton ( or Symantec) Solutions folder you did to update your virus definitions (see above instructions).
• Double-click on the Norton AntiVirus icon.

• Click on the hard drive icon to select it
• Click on the Scan/Repair button in the lower right corner.

You can continue to work while the scan is in progress but computer performance may be a bit slower.

Note: You can also have Norton regularly run scans by setting up a Scheduled Task like you did in the steps above for updating virus definitions. Instead of Product Update, you select AntiVirus Scan.

If the scan does find any viruses, you can delete them or call the HelpDesk at x2001 for more information.

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Page last updated 08/14/06. Send questions or comments to ITS Training.