Rating:?Ǭ† 4/5

General Info: For whatever reasons, Macs have not succumbed to nearly any attacks by hackers, be they malware, hacking, or similar. Macs are not invincible though. Some relatively minor attacks on Macs have been recorded, yet this does not mean a major attack will not occur. The sheer number of people who want to anger computer users is disgusting. Little Snitch is an app that allows you to prevent these possibilities, to see virtually every network connection on your Mac. When a new connection is made, a dialog box asks if you want to allow that connection. While, at this point, I believe no virus protection software is needed on Mac, Little Snitch is an app that any paranoid security conscious person ought to look at. Besides the steps of using a non-admin (and certainly not Root) account, strict firewall settings, good passwords, and plain logic, Little Snitch is the best way to boost security.

Unfortunately, Little Snitch, like all security software, has some drawbacks. Little Snitch has one big drawback: it has to put up a dialog if you want to allow a connection with each app. This is especially irritating for a software reviewer who uses new apps on a regular basis. What would be nice is if Little Snitch already had a database of known, good apps. Who should buy Little Snitch? Anyone who’s been hacked before, people with ?¢‚Ǩ?ìmission critical?¢‚Ǩ¬ù need of their Mac, people who use many apps from untrusted sources, and generally paranoid and security conscious people. For other geeky people, try it out the demo to see how many apps use the Internet (it’s cool).

Retail Price: $24.95

Site: http://www.obdev.at/products/littlesnitch/index.html

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 31st, 2007 at 6:09 pm and is filed under Network, Reviews, Software, Utilities, Web. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.