Security software - necessary on a Mac?

[American Psycho]

I know entirely all the arguments for Macs being much better security and much less likely to get a virus than a Windows PC. Sure there are probably 1% of the viruses for Macs that there are for Windows, but that's still a lot of viruses nonetheless.

I haven't installed any AV software on my Mac but that said I am very security conscious.

The key question is does Modee use any AV software for Mac?

[Modee]

I run both Avast and Norton antivirus on all my MACs. Avast also screens all incoming email attachments that arrive to my MSFT Outlook.

Doesn't hurt to run Malwarebytes Anti-Malware every now and then too.

[American Psycho]

Is that not overkill? I also thought running two AV software programs simultaneously caused problems, no?

[Modee]

Works for me. Avast seems to take the closest charge of matters.

[American Psycho]

Have you ever been infected with anything on a Mac? I've never found any viruses after any scans on a Mac

[Modee]

On my MACs, I have found adware that needed to be removed, and yes also bits and pieces of downloads that were infected. The infected downloads did not affect anything but they were there and removed after virus scan. The reason MACs have less such issues is not necessarily because they are more secure, but because virus creators concentrate on creating the maximum havoc, which is within the PC market since there are far more PCs than MACs.

[American Psycho]

It seems you always recommend using Firefox on Mac over Safari. Why is that?

I generally find Safari much faster and uses up less battery on Mac, are there any compelling reasons to use Firefox as default instead?

[Modee]

I don't use Safari much at all, except for certain applet loads such as Ameritrade's Trade Architect, which seems to load best off Safari. I use Chrome for most operations and reserve Firefox for more sensitive work like eBay, PayPal, etc. because it works best with the latest flash object (LSO) removing software I recommend in the Short List.