In a fresh development, this doesn't affect our editorial independence. When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission.

The report highlights that the result: Windows users face a risk six times greater than macOS users. VPN provider Surfshark has investigated the extent to which Windows and macOS are at risk from malware and phishing.

According to the latest update, while Windows devices accounted for 66 percent of Surfshark’s active user base, they accounted for 92 percent of all threat detections. By comparison, only eight percent of threat detections were recorded on macOS, even though macOS users made up 34 percent of the user base. According to its own figures, the cybersecurity firm analyzed 391,305 malware detections logged by Surfshark Antivirus between January 1 and July 31.

In a fresh development, doing some quick math, that means Windows PCs have a threat-detection rate of almost six times higher than Macs.

The report highlights that surfshark identified over 166,000 Trojan attacks on Windows computers, compared with just over 7,600 on macOS. For viruses, the comparative figures are just over 32,000 on Windows and around 2,900 on macOS. Trojans pose the greatest threat to Windows users.

As part of the ongoing story, riskware refers to programs that are generally legitimate but which, due to their functionality, may pose a security risk. Examples include remote maintenance tools, data extraction tools, password managers, or server services. As for riskware, Surfshark reports around 67,500 detections on Windows and 5,400 on macOS.

The report highlights that however, macOS users shouldn’t be lulled into a false sense of security, as Surfshark warns:.

In a fresh development, mac users still assume that their device is inherently more secure, which can make them far more vulnerable to social engineering tactics such as phishing than to conventional malware.

Industry observers note that while phishing is the third-biggest threat to macOS users, according to Surfshark, it plays only a minor role for Windows users.

In a fresh development, this article originally appeared on our sister publication PC-WELT and was translated and localized from German.

As part of the ongoing story, he has been writing on almost all IT topics for around 25 years, covering everything from news to reviews and buying guides. Hans-Christian Dirscherl began his IT life with Autoexec.bat and config.sys, Turbo-Pascal and C, Sinix and Wordperfect.