IF YOU BELIEVE Apple's marketing then you would think that the expensive fruity machines are more secure than PCs.

After all, most of the viruses out there are designed for the PC and Apple users hardly suffer from the problem. But this line of reasoning does not influence corporate IT managers who, were it true, would be trying to stave off hackers by installing shedloads of Apple gear.

However that's not the case. Most tell us that even if Apple gear was half the price it's just security by obscurity. A determined hacker who wanted to get into corporate systems would be though it like a knife through butter.

Tyler Reguly, a senior security research engineer with Ncircle told the newnewinternet that if you take a look at the two platforms, and the mindsets of the companies behind them, then the Windows PC wins hands down. He said that the Mac ships with more exploitable vulnerabilities already on a system when it is delivered. Further, Eric Johanson, a security researcher pointed out that the Mac OS X has far more published vulnerabilities per user than Windows.

However Apple is also actually more insecure because of the attitude of its customers. A computer's security, if it exists, is only as good as the user. Unfortunately in the case of the Mac the user is a smug, technologically illiterate person who believes they are invulnerable because they use a Mac. Such people randomly press buttons, visit sites that sensible people don't and download things carelessly because Apple's marketing tells them they are safe.

A recent Eset survey last year showed that when Apple users fell for phishing crime they tended to lose a lot more cash than a Windows PC user. The cynic in me thinks that if you spend a third more than you need to for your PC and think that the Ipad is a pretty neat idea then you are exactly the sort of mark that a phishing campaign is designed to reach.