Although you need to reboot to switch OS's I find that one advantage is it runs faster since it isn't being run as a program inside the Mac OS. You can also use those same partitions when using Paralles which is a good vm software, however it isn't free. I'm running Windows in a virtual machine on my mac (via Parallels). Should I bother installing antivirus, firewall and using other conventional wisdom practices (like don't open unknown.exe etc)? I don't care about data in the virtual machine since I'm using Windows just to run some software which I can't in OSX. So if something goes wrong I can just re-install windows from scratch. Conversely I care about the data I have on my mac and even though I do regular backups it will be really bad if I happen to lose them. You don't want a VM. You want something like docker on steroids. You want completely unprivileged hosting of processes to do things that you know already are going to be a problem for you. That is a clear sign that whatever you are doing is about to be accompanied by the software development equivalent of 'here, hold my beer'. Just remember, a virtual machine is still of class machine, so this is a computer, just not on the bare metal. What I use VMs for day-to-day are development, and I run AV and all the rest all time. Yes, it's an impediment. But I still do it. – Feb 21 '16 at 20:55. Your virtual Windows is on the same network with your OSX, so the same threats of having an infected device on a network applies to this VM. ![]() Your VM is equivalent to a PC in your network its not much different. The same security practices that apply to your PC also applies to your VMs. • Although OSX does not run the same malicious apps that run on windows machines, that VM can still be a threat to rest of the devices on the network. • It can also consume your machine's resources in case it becomes infected and make your host machine slow too. • At times you may login to your email/cloud account on the VM to download something and in case the VM is infected with a keylogger, your data can be stolen. • You may connect a USB Flash drive to the VM to transfer files elsewhere and infection can spread this way. Try to keep the guest operating system along with softwares used in it updated at minimum. If you use it moderately get a free antivirus like microsoft's Windows Defender. One other threat is Ransomwares, Parallels Desktop has a feature that shares some of your OSX folders with windows. If your windows VM gets infected with a ransomware, it can possibly encrypt your shared files causing damage to your important data. Other than the points mentioned above plus the clipboard which SilverlightFox mentioned, it says: 13.3.4. Potentially insecure operations Enabling 3D graphics via the Guest Additions exposes the host to additional security risks; see Section 4.5.1, “Hardware 3D acceleration (OpenGL and Direct3D 8/9)”. When Page Fusion (see Section 4.9.2, “Page Fusion”) is enabled, it is possible that a side-channel opens up that allows a malicious guest to determine the address space layout (i.e. Where DLLs are typically loaded) of one other VM running on the same host. This information leak in it self is harmless, however the malicious guest may use it to optimize attack against that VM via unrelated attack vectors. It is recommended to only enable Page Fusion if you do not think this is a concern in your setup. While you're using a different hypervisor, it is imaginable that same type of risks also apply to that. In addition to, if you're sharing the clipboard with your Mac, then any malware that logs clipboard contents could steal something sensitive copied to the clipboard from your Mac. There is also the possibility that malware could traverse from the VM and execute on your Mac. This is very unlikely to happen, although it is theoretically possible should any such vulnerabilities exist in Parallels. There could also be malware that would make your VM part of a botnet without you necessarily realising.
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