Charles on… anything that comes along

This question just occurred to me while emailing a mate: do Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates know what it’s like to have a virus zap their system? I mean, have they personally experienced it, either of them? Or have pop-ups ever plagued their life online?

Or do those two use their machines in a sort of little bubble, of encrypted networks shut off from the wider world? Do they run antivirus software? Anti-spyware? Ad-blockers? Do they always make sure they’re completely up to date with software updates? One imagines their notebooks are so valuable, in terms of corporate info, that they would be wary of installing an update that might interfere with anything.

Aha: some browsing reveals that BillG has suffered, according to this eWeek article: Asked if he’d ever personally been hit by a computer virus, Gates responded, “I haven’t had a virus on my machine… basically ever.” But the Microsoft chairman added that machines at his home had been infected with “malware or adware” requiring him to run scanning software on them. Bad Melissa! Stop surfing those pr0n sites!

So here’s my question to more Microsoft employees: do you run AV? Anti-spyware? Ad-blocking? Firewall? If not, why not? Have you ever had a virus? If not, is it just luck? Do you use Internet Explorer, or another browser? If not, why? If your answer is mostly or wholly “no” then surely not having experienced the same frustrations as your users must make empathising with them harder. They say “better security” and you hear “more features”, for example. I shall ask all those Microsofties I meet these questions. Any dropping by are welcome to answer in comments. You can be anonymous.

For my part, I don’t run AV or anti-spyware or a firewall, though I do stay up to date with software updates. But then, I’m using Apple’s OSX, which so far has no known viruses (not even proof-of-concept) and only a couple of POC bits of malware that are as difficult to find as Windows virii are plentiful.

Of course if my invitation to meet Steve Ballmer hadn’t unaccountably gone astray in the PR process I could have asked him myself earlier this week. Or perhaps someone with a transcript of Sunday’s interview could tell us whether this fascinating point was raised..? [Apologies if this post appears twice in a feed. I accidentally deleted it earlier. ..and that’s why the RSS feed wouldn’t validate.]

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• A mobile phone pandemic? (12 March 2005; score: 43.21%)
• Why do you use a Mac? The answer's in the question, sorta (30 January 2007; score: 37.57%)
• Jim Allchin vs SecurityFocus: safety in numbers, or in niches? (21 April 2005; score: 36.89%)