It is no secret that Macs are a minority in business, but the speed at which Apple has taken bites of market share each year is a force to be reckoned with. When we talk with business owners who are searching for mac accounting software (and other secure inventory and production software for mac), the question often comes up: “is Mac growing because companies are getting tired of Windows security risks?”

The reasons for Apple’s growth are many, but for a slice of the perspective, we take a peek at the legal field. A 2013 CLIO survey found that in a control group consisting of 90% attorney firms and 10%  law students or non-lawyers, over 60% have been using Macs for at least 2 years and almost half of those have been using macs for 3 years or more.  You can probably guess why: 52% of respondents stated they chose Apple  because the technology was more reliable and secure.

The issue of network and PC safety and security (note, those are two very different things) seems to be driving market forces more than ever before, as we discovered by an overwhelming response to this post about Apple’s OS X security issues from last month.

A quick search shows how CNET took a look at this seriously a few years ago, citing an ESET survey which bore the headline:

More than half of Americans believe that PCs are “very” or “extremely” vulnerable to cybercrime attacks, while only 20 percent say the same about Macs.”

Here are some interesting perspectives shared by some of the top security experts in the country. For a full editorial on this, click here.

Ross Anderson, professor of security engineering at the Computer Laboratory at University of Cambridge:

“Computer criminals differ from ordinary criminals in that they’re more rational. The bulk of normal crime–burglaries, muggings, car thefts–is done by disadvantaged young men, often illiterate and with drug and alcohol problems. The bulk of e-crime is done by technically sophisticated people living in poor countries like Russia, India, or Brazil. So while preventing normal crime is about sociology, preventing online crime is about economics. Malware writers are rational, as are botnet herders. They would far rather attack Windows PCs as there are lots more of them. So you are much less likely to be bothered by malware if you use a Mac, or run Linux on your PC.”

Nitesh Dhanjani, researcher and consultant:

“I realize the market share argument is a cliche, but I feel it is true–OS X wins from a security perspective because it has a lower market share. Windows Vista and Windows 7 have some impressive security controls that are not present in OS X. If we were to flip the market share, we would see a lot more exploitation in the wild. More specifically, browser security is one of the more important items to consider today from a risk perspective. I know Internet Explorer has had a considerable share of vulnerabilities, but theSafari Web browser also has a lousy reputation in the security community–it almost seems a child’s play to locate an exploitable condition in Safari. Apple really needs to get its act together with Safari since OS X is enjoying a healthy market share climb at the moment.”

Frank Heidt, CEO of Leviathan Security:

“I’m tempted to go with the safe answer that the size of the installed Microsoft base makes Apple ‘more secure’ because it is targeted less often. The risk landscape for consumers (and enterprises) has changed over the last few years. Operating systems as such are no longer the primary target of consumer-targeted attacks; applications are. In light of that fact, I’d say each operating system has its benefits and liabilities. The real risks lie in the consumer’s browser choice, and security habits. From a browser standpoint, I would choose Firefox over IE, and IE over Safari.”