When a seasoned Windows user first migrates to Linux, the first question is always “where is the anti-virus?” I have been asked this question countless time and were always given the “you are lying to me” kind of look when I told them that they don’t need anti-virus software in Linux.

Over the decade where computer viruses have become so rampant, it is to no surprise that many people are treating Windows and anti-virus software as one unit; and that one cannot live without the other. This is deeply imprinted in people’s mind and I suspect that if one day, they were to live without anti-virus software, they will have nightmares.

Back to the issue about anti-virus software in Linux: when I say that Linux don’t need anti-virus software, I don’t mean that it is completely safe from virus attack. In fact, anyone who say that Linux is completely safe from virus attack is saying a big fat lie. No operating system is completely safe from virus attack, and you can be sure that the salesman who is trying to sell you the EeePC is lying to you when he says that there is no virus for Linux. What I am trying to bring across is that: it is much more difficult for a virus to infect a Linux machine, even without anti-virus software. Let’s see why is this so…

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