Historically, Linux was considered to be the most secure operating system available. One aspect that’s always made it a more secure system than Windows is that root-level (administrator) access rights are not given to every user. If you want to run an executable program on Linux, you have to enter the root-level password.

This means that it’s harder for malware to cause system-wide damage if it manages to worm its way into a device running Linux. it’s easier to remove the virus if a user account, rather than a root-level account, is the only part of th system impacted.

Linux code is open-source and there’s a large community of knowledgeable developers and engineers hunting for vulnerabilities and patching software bugs.

Another advantage is the Linux distribution model. Linux distributions (distros) are operating systems compiled from components that have come out of open-source projects. This has allowed security-focused operating systems like Qubes OS to arise.

Of course, Linux has always had another advantage: it’s not a very popular operating system. Far fewer people use it than Windows. This means that cyber criminals haven’t made relatively little malware for it, at least compared to its widely-used rival.

However, this is slowly changing. Linux is more popular now than it’s ever has been before, which has likely led to an increased malware threat users should be aware of. In fact, some reports suggest that Linux malware reached an all-time high in 2022.

macOS – a secure OS with great built-in security features

As we mentioned in the introduction to this article, the idea that Apple products can’t get infected with malware is a myth – but there’s a good reason behind it.

For starters, Apple’s hardware and software are tightly integrated with one another. Virtually all physical devices running macOS will be an Apple product, whereas Windows can be – and regularly is – installed on a range of different devices that aren’t manufactured by Microsoft, such as computers from Dell, HP, ASUS, etc.

That means Apple can have tighter control over its security updates, focus its support better around a smaller collection of devices and secure its hardware perimeter in a more meaningful way.

macOS is also full of top-quality security features, such as Gatekeeper, which vets all apps you download from the App Store, and XProtect, which scans documents for malicious code. All in all, there are plenty of features to keep users safe, and macOS is by no means an unsecure system.

If you’re a Mac user, it’s important to remember that your OS is not impenetrable, and there’s quite a lot of Mac malware out there now. In 2020, for instance, cybersecurity researchers charted a surge in the amount of Mac malware being distributed – but as we’ve said, it still pales in comparison to the number of viruses created for Windows computers.

Windows – considered the least secure OS

As was mentioned earlier, the key reason that Windows appears more vulnerable than Mac, Chrome, and Linux products is simply that it’s used by a larger number of people. This incentivizes threat actors to create malware for Windows more so than any other operating system, and the threat level is simply higher due to this.

Although Windows offers multi-user systems now, historically, you’d always log in as an administrator. This meant that if you were compromised, the threat actor would have instant access to system-level privileges that could then be used to escalate the attack further. This is not the case with macOS or Linux, and never has been.

What’s more, Windows code is not open-source like Linux and Mac, so Microsoft has to rely on its engineering team to spot and patch vulnerabilities.