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Microsoft Security Essentials Released; Rivals Mock It
Bimal writes "After a short three-month beta program, Microsoft is officially releasing Microsoft Security Essentials, its free, real-time consumer anti-malware solution for fighting viruses, spyware, rootkits, and Trojans. MSE is available for Windows XP 32-bit, Windows Vista/7 32-bit, and Windows Vista/7 64-bit. 'Ars puts MSE through its paces and finds an unobtrusive app with a clean interface that protected us in the dark corners of the Internet.' The software received positive notes when in beta, including a nod from the independent testing group AV-Test." But reader CWmike notes that Symantec is trash-talking Microsoft's free offering. Jens Meggers, Symantec's vice president of engineering, dismissed MSE as a "poor product" that will "never be up to snuff." Meggers added, "Microsoft has a really bad track record in security." The GM of Trend Micro's consumer division sniffed, "It's better to use something than to use nothing, but you get what you pay for."
Doesn't bug, silent updates, fast scans, no noticeable performance hit. I can finally get my parents off of their annoying Norton or whatever they paid $50 to use for 12 months.
When Pressed, Symantec admitted they were actually describing their own products, burst into tears, and chugged the rest of the bottle of whiskey.
Bah, who needs that newfangled stuff. This always works for me:
msav c:
Kids these days...
...competing anti virus companies?
How and I not surprised?
Of course Trend Micro and Symantec will give it negative reviews (ie opinions) because they don't want people opting for Microsoft's free alternative instead of subscribing to their products.
That said, of course Microsoft's latest offering isn't the only free one, but just by its nature of being released will generate Security Essentials lots of media attention.
Sorry to throw Symantec under the bus, but the AV program and AV mentality that they have created amounts to a CPU tax. We don't have 4 core machines, we have 3 cores plus for one for Symantec, which manages to have the deadlock everything while it scans a single file.
This is my sig.
Around the computer shop's i've worked at we joke that we'd rather have a virus than norton on our machines, at least the virus won't charge you a fee to mess up your OS.
- Better to speak your mind than to remain silent, or someone may speak for you.
A virtual virus can be as bad as a real virus. Deleted files and pirated bandwidth are the same either way.
Table-ized A.I.
Symantec's vice president of engineering, dismissed MFE as a "poor product" that will "never be up to snuff."
Pot, meet kettle.
Symantec's products aren't exactly admired for security and effectiveness in recent years. Pot, meet Kettle,
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
And what, use a fresh drive image every time you boot up the virtual machine?
It's still the same problem except it's possible to detect virtual rootkits from the host OS.
Last I checked some of the highest detection rate AV solutions also happen to be free.
I use Avira AntiVir, which came in #2 in the last comparative study I read. It's gratis, with the sole "cost" of a popup-ad every 24h, disabled in the paid version (or for free, if you know how to set up a local security policy under windows and don't mind breaking the EULA).
So let's see, independent groups give positive reviews. One of the main competitors give it a negative review. Who to believe?
If the Windows software you need is storing your data on the Windows VM, it really doesn't matter if it's running on your hardware or not. Assuming you subscribe to the belief that it's difficult to secure Windows, you would still stand to have your data compromised.
Anyone remember a software product called QEMM back in the DOS days? It was a tool to deal with this horrid thing known as "high-mem" back in the bad old days before Windows 95, allowing one to have more memory to run Win 3.1. It was written by a company called Quarterdeck Office Systems and it built their business. Microsoft came out with a tool that did the same thing called memmaker that worked well enough and did the same thing and they bundled it with DOS 5.0 (I think it was 5.0). Though, not as efficient as QEMM it was good enough and ultimately led to the demise of Quarterdeck (along with a bunch of other dumb mistakes).
It's a sweet little anti-virus program. A well designed and simple user interface, updates unobtrusively, doesn't bog down the computer and it is very effective at detecting all threats I've thrown its way. It also is easy to tell when it is unhappy thanks to a well designed and simple system tray icon. Credit where credit is due, Microsoft has put together a good program. I've tested this on dozens of machines and have not a single bad thing to say about it, which is not something I would have thought I'd ever say about a Microsoft product.
If I do have a quibble, it's that it requires a validated Windows. If I were Microsoft I'd throw this on automatic Windows Update and push it out to everyone not already running an anti-virus.
Symantec can blow me. I've seen more hosed computers where the owners thought they had current updated Symantec AV just to have me discover that their definitions had last been updated in 2007 or something with no indication from their Symantec AV they were vulnerable.
To tell me it's working, it sounds like pretty much the best thing out there.
When the CEO of your competition derides your product publicly, you know it's got to be good shit.
Platform advocacy is like choosing a favorite severely developmentally disabled child.
For things that need to be persistent(ie. normal user use) that is a pain in the ass because all your stuff keeps disappearing unless you save it somewhere else; but VMware and friends make it really easy to do, great for testing, paranoid access to IE legacy sites, and the like. The original disk image never gets touched, and the changes that accumulate during use get nuked when the VM shuts down.
And what, use a fresh drive image every time you boot up the virtual machine?
It's still the same problem except it's possible to detect virtual rootkits from the host OS.
No, only use the VM for specific, limited purposes where there is no easily-usable Linux alternative. Although the snapshots or fresh image idea sounds promising too...
A couple of years ago, a friend I've ended up doing free support for (c'mon, we all have a few) wanted a new computer. She ended up with a nice new dual-core machine with 2 gig RAM and Ubuntu. Virtualbox and XP went on there in case she "needed" windows for anything - it was way faster than any Windows install she'd had on real hardware - and it turns out that the only thing she ever uses the XP virtual machine for is her tax return because the Australian Tax Office requires a Microsoft environment. She knows better than to use the XP VM for casual browsing too, as I've cleaned a metric fuckload of malware off her windows machines in the past. I figure I'll need to upgrade her machine to Karmic once the dust settles, but I don't remember the last time I went six months without having to do something serious to her machine - let alone two years.
I've used Avast Antivirus (free), Malwarebytes Anti-Malware (free) and Comodo Firewall (free) for a couple of years now. I've never had a virus and various other types of malware are promptly and efficiently dealt with.
Trust the inventors of Windows Genuine Advantage with my security? Or freakin' Symantec? I won't bore you with the horrible, hellish experience of getting Norton Antivirus off my machine. It was harder to get rid of than the virus it failed to catch.
Fat chance. I'll stay with something that works, thank you very much.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Falling back to a clean snapshot regularly (or always... can VM clients be configured to always boot from a snapshot? If grandma doesn't update her antivirus, she's not going to roll back her VM.) would help to mitigate both problems.
Big name for just adding the "Uninstall" option to the Windows menu.
Is This
Frankly If this was an actual product Demonstration, Chickens would become Extinct before Norton did anything about it.
In Soviet Russia, Trojan exploits YOU!
At last microsoft released it's free Anti virus
Regards
Meer Akbar Ali
I like how this article just quotes 2 people who make their living charging money for a similar product and *gasp* they didn't think it was very good! Next lets ask Steve Balmer if we should be in line to get a copy of Windows 7 on release day.
The bastards blacklisted my IP claiming it was dynamic and a possible source of spam and it was neither. Bunch of jerks and I'll never believe anything they say.
"Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...
I just formatted and installed XP SP3 on a machine running an Intel 2.4Ghz CPU (Northwood and non-HT). I've noticed that installing applications take about four times as long after having installed this program. The culprit seems to be a running process "MsMpEng.exe" pushing CPU utilization to a total of 100%. I did not have Windows Defender installed, but it's interesting to note this is the same file that it uses too. I'm guessing Microsoft Security Essentials is a close cousin to Windows Defender code which would explain a lot.
Other than that, it seems to stay out of the way under general computing. But for those looking to do a format/reinstall of Windows, I recommend installing this program AFTER you get finished with everything else on your to-do install list.
Life is not for the lazy.
Using Windows inside a VM makes removing dangerous stuff like rootkits easy (e.g. by simply falling back to a snapshot).
But if someone catches a trojan and then directly heads for his bank website to do some transfers, the VM doesn't do shit to protect him. Same goes for worms, spambots and all the other crazy stuff. As long as the VM is running, they are as dangerous as ever. Telling people by running stuff in VMs makes them immune to threats just gives a false sense of security.
Symantec aside how can a corporation, Microsoft, make an antivirus solution for their own product?
Execuse me if I'm missing something here but shouldn't they fix the security holes to prevent the problem in the first place?
Okay, now that Microsoft makes an antivirus, someone explain to me why they haven't simply dedicated all this effort to debugging Windows, closing security holes and stabilizing code? Can anyone now sufficiently explain their motivation to do so? I don't see anymore reason for Microsoft to clean up the mess that they made, now that they've thrown a board over the pothole instead of repaving the frickin' road.
If Microsoft makes Windows secure and stable, then, in theory, the antivirus industry is out of business. Someone, please, convince me to remove my tinfoil hat.
Let q be a radix > 1. I am in ur base-q, killing 10 d00ds.
There is a downside to the solution you have mentioned... You no longer have an excuse to visit your "friend" as much...
Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne
Your Freedom
Persian Project Management Software as a Service
But will it run Crysis?
(sorry...)
Now correct me if I'm incorrect, but was I told it's untrue that people in Springfield have no faith? Was I not misinformed?
Linux has less low-hanging crapware for the plucking than Windows, but that's no reason to switch. If she switches for that reason then she still hasn't addressed the underlying problem of clicking YES YES YES YES to everything, and it's going to screw her over in Linux land eventually.
Step one: install Linux
Step two: install your favorite virtualization product
Step three: run Windows in the VM. NEVER let it run the hardware.
Meh. I prefer free-range operating systems.
And what, use a fresh drive image every time you boot up the virtual machine?
Works for me. Of course, all I use a VM for these days is testing my work with IE6/XP, IE7/XP, etc. :)
Wow... I mean, I expect third party developers to ignore it, but not MS... unless this is a ploy to encourage upgrading to Windows 7. Well, my XP 64 install boots after the dots make 1.5 trips across the bar, I have yet to see any Vista (or XP 32) do it with less than 3. It's going to take a lot more than this to get me to upgrade, you hear!
Just set her up with a minimalist desktop environment. Then she'll have to run shell commands to install anything hostile :)
You must really enjoy Solitaire and Minesweeper.
Seriously, who better to defend an OS against threats than the developers themselves? Antivirus is just another security feature.
Symantec's vice president of engineering, dismissed MSE as a "poor product" that will "never be up to snuff."
That has been true of every major Microsoft product when it was released; it has never stopped Microsoft from killing its competitors through persistence, pressure, backroom deals, marketing, and deep pockets.
Like an army of dead zombies, Microsoft products may be ugly, stinky, and brainless, but they just won't die.
to make everybody on Slashdot rush to defend MS.
Lots of humourless Microsoft shills here today. The "Uninstall Windows"-posts aren't trolls, there attempts at being funny. Lighten up for once. To be slightly on topic: I'd trust neither Norton nor Microsoft with the security on my systems, but if it actually does protect people and doesn't get in the way for the users, it's all the better.
-- Linux user #369862
I wonder if Symantec's negative reviews might actually help Microsoft.
If Symantec hates it... sign me up!
I've been using Microsofts OneCare security suite for over a year now and I absolutely love it. It has been able to stop, detect and remove and lot of pieces of malware, spyware and trojans. I can see how Microsoft got a bad rap in the past, and I used to believe Microsoft software in the security field was unreliable but OneCare has changed my thinking. I think Symantec might be rushing to judgment a bit quickly but time will tell whether Microsofts new innovation is a worthwhile endeavor
"Norton" Utilities started to go downhill the moment it was acquired by Symantec, and after just two years I could no longer stand to use the product. Not only did the "utility" of the product steadily decrease, I found the virus / malware detection to continually be substandard compared to cheaper and even freeware products.
I am aware that there are people who still swear by Symantec products, and I do not wish to argue with them. But I was with that family of products ever since Peter Norton put them together into a package, and is is simply not up to the standards that his personal software met... no matter how big their corporation is today.
Boo, Symantec. I use Kaspersky and a few other tools now, and even though it takes several separate tools, I find the whole to be both superior in performance and also less intrusive into my system than Norton Utilities and other Symantec products.
Your Freedom
The freedom which matters to the Windows user is the freedom to run his Windows programs.
He has no interest in ideological purity or political correctness.
Symantec's products aren't exactly admired for security and effectiveness in recent years. Pot, meet Kettle,
Their product for the Mac has a horrid reputation. I've heard it called "malware for the Mac".
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
Could you provide a link for this which involves a "serious" anti-virus company (Norton/McAfee/Kaspersky/BitDefender etc.) and an actual released to the field piece of malware. "There are cases" could include the "anti-virus" packages advertised via online ads which actually are malware.
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
It's okay I have Antivirus2009
You're a retard. You haven't used the product but you _know_ it sucks. Right.
Opinion: Dismissed.
Of course they are going to downplay it and diss it. It is FREE COMPETITION. That is something you definitely don't want becoming popular. Not if you're Symantec.
Don't let this obvious bias junkola skew your perception. Hell, its free. i'm gonna try it out probably and if it works it works, if not, I'll just uninstall like any other things I don't wan on my OS.
Looks great, and the article by Emil Protalinski is well written. I am not a windows user (unless supporting XP, Vista, & 7 in VMWare 2 counts) and I am not going to renew Nod32 next time. Those detractors can't be trusted to review this new program, can they? A few months in the field here will give it a good test (India/Nepal) and I'll report back then. So far, the only thing that has given trouble free protection in this environment has been Nod32, which MSE sure looks a lot like from the screen shots. But as I tell my clients, to be really safe they have to run windows virtualized with snapshots or whatever, as it's the only 100% safe way to protect their PCs, albeit a bit technical. Thx /. for keeping on top of this...
I think therefore I can't be ~TTNH
Linux has less low-hanging crapware for the plucking than Windows, but that's no reason to switch. If she switches for that reason then she still hasn't addressed the underlying problem of clicking YES YES YES YES to everything, and it's going to screw her over in Linux land eventually.
The reason she switched was that I was sick of the endless rebuild-pwned-rebuild cycle from that low-hanging crapware, and Microsoft's updates are completely unworkable on dial-up. I'd come up with a way to provide her with updates on DVDs every couple of months, or as required, and that hasn't happened as often as it should have, but in practice hasn't been much of an issue. If she had a faster connection I'd just point the thing at a local mirror and let it hassle her when stuff needed updating, but her occasionally-updated Ubuntu system has been a lot better behaved than her occasionally-updated Windows ones were. And yeah, I'm aware that some of this is likely to be due to security-through-obscurity.
Also, I don't believe she was clicking YES YES YES YES to everything, and was moderately discerning (for end-user values of discerning). I seem to recall things improving significantly when I managed to move her off Outhouse Express and Internet Exploder too, without significant changes in browsing habits, but still not to the point of having stuff "just work" for two years.
Maybe he finally figured out that the part of the ladder theory he occupies means he will never get the nookie.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Go to the official site . *Looks at the image on the main page* I didn't realise hot asian chicks went out with guys that installed free antivirus software for them.
maybe im the most ignorant one here, but for years i have been living virus free with a simple anti-virus subscription (avast! home edition if your curious) and good surfing practices without forking out a cent. i see some of these people who have viruses up the nose because they like to click on or download whatever shiny thing catches their eye and it signals a big red flag for anyone smart enough to connect the dots when your trying to get rid of a virus on someones computer and they have all the latest downloads from bigfishgames. i don't think its really the program that you have to depend on as much as it is your own habits. of course all i do is browse the web as far as online interactions go.
"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
So, does this replace the functionality of Windows Defender, or does it cover areas not covered by Defender? If it is the latter then you have yet another service that slows start-up and chews resources.
Patent litigation: A doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction... in which everyone seems willing to push the button
This isn't the first time Microsoft has done an anti-virus product. I remember using MSAV.EXE for MS-DOS. I wonder if Microsoft just took this out of their digital freezer, updated that code base slightly, and gave it some new chrome?
Microsoft purchased Komoku, a developer of RootKit Detection software with clients like the usual government and military suspects, banks, that kind of thing. Komoku's technology has been rolled into Microsoft Security Essentials.
I would think that right there is a good reason to check it out, and possibly implement it in your XP/Win7 system, especially since MS probably had a chance to do some tweaking on the RootKit detection engine using their proprietary knowledge of some of the more obscure aspects of Windows file systems, the still unpublished NTFS specification, etc.
Of course, if you have no RootKits installed, it might be more of a pain than necessary ... after all, every AV app you now have running says nolo problemo, si?
Then again, how would you know?
if you do have a RootKit lurking, I find it very difficult to believe that Norton or Symantec would tell you so ... the whole point of RootKits are to avoid detection, whether by conventional AV applications or otherwise, and to avoid removal by the usual removal tools available to AV product users.
Some RootKits are even stealth-installed by law enforcement, and the "person of interest" isn't supposed to have Norton go all five-alarm on them, if you get my drift. Not that we can be sure this will either ... I'm just sayin' they are not trivial to detect, is all.
It remains to be seen exactly what MicrosoftSecurityEssentials does turn up, but in at least one aspect, you are getting (for free) security software that cost thousands of dollars had you contracted with the original developer prior to Microsoft's acquisition (March 20 2008) and prior to MS's adding at least some of that same software to this new app.
There will be plenty of people who will jump in right away and download MicrosoftSE. If you're one of them, fine; don't change for my sake.
But, the best advice might be wait a week or so, as the prudent should, to see if major issues develop once widespread deployment exposes the suite to a wider set of configurations. If all is well, I say "run her". When MS offers you the equivalent of "free money" I say take it. I never see them refuse mine.
It makes me suspicious. Usually when there's an article about Microsoft, even if it's about something good they're doing, everyone on Slashdot attacks them. It strikes me as odd, how many comments are giving this software a chance. Almost as if a bunch of MS employees are posting comments.
MS discontinued OneCare around a year ago genius (see here). The free Security Essentials release we're discussing in TFA is what the OneCare team got spun off into..
So, what kind of performance hit are we talking about here, that being that the PC in question is a gaming PC and needs every cycle I can squeeze out of it, should I even bother? I rarely surf on that specific PC and I don't read mail on it either (Have a real OS for those things.)
a friend I've ended up doing free support for (c'mon, we all have a few)
What? Really free? I usually fix friends PCs for beer.
She
Oh, now I see. But now that her PC's sorted, you don't get to see her so often. Reinstall XP, you might get laid...
It is Microsoft's *responsibility* to secure *their* OS. They should've picked up the AV slack years ago, and they never did - So others decided to pick it up for them (and make a buck at the same time).
No one is right here, everyone is in the wrong because no one wants to admit that the OS is as insecure as a convict's ***
Not happy with forcing WGA and automated WindowsUpdate when you install this antivirus, MSE also forces DRM and Silverlight down your throat. Oh... and you are not authorized to talk about MSE without written consent from Microsoft.
Just read the license.
Doh!
Well, I always welcome free solutions which enhance overall end users security, but this licence is a no-no for me.
Anything that Microsoft does to improve windows..is a good thing. Tdiaz
A fast scan for a AV product generally means it is doing pure signature based scans which were abandoned in MS DOS 6.22 ages by real AV companies. There is no analysis of any kind going on, no decompression, no link checking, no behavioral pattern checking.
Does every freeware AV do such things? Of course not but when OS vendor suggests "here is your AV solution", it is more like trusting to Apple's simple snow leopard trojan checker in Safari. Once there is a real developer who can code morphing code, that checker is useless.
It's OK, I guess.
One issue I have with it is that I like to disable real-time scanning with any AV software I use, because it makes file management rather sluggish, particularly if I'm working in a folder containing a lot of executables. Before trying MSE I've been using AVG Free with the real-time scanning turned off, which works really well. If I download something new and I'm suspicious, I simply scan it manually via a right-click and scan in Explorer. Plus, I can tell AVG to ignore the fact I've turned the real-time scanning off and it won't bug me or complain about the fact. With MSE, if you disable real-time scanning, the tray icon goes read, and in Windows 7 you'll be prompted by the action center that it's disabled, but unlike AVG, I can't find any way to tell it that I know what I'm doing, and to trust my judgement.
Real-time scanning is a pain in the ass. It's necessary if you don't have any discipline when using a Windows machine, but if you do, you should be able to disable it without the AV software treating you like an idiot.
These guys managed to make windows "safe", simply a "root terminal" with careless user on the other side clicking "OK" to each prompt like a robot.
If they weren't fast and they didn't share their data in certain large malwareinfections, MS you see now wouldn't exist. Ordinary users won't care about their lousy coding, business practices until one day, all Work computers they have acts like out of control, they lose massive money, the govt. departments cease to function.
AV programs (please, forget norton) has reached this point because there were free competition out there. Once more, MS breaks competition from outside, we will really see the results soon.
You sound like all the "competition" is evil, payware solutions. They are freeware and some very good freeware exists like Avast.
I guess we got old and they can't remember that junk named as "virus scanner" diverting users from real virus scanners as "they already have it" so they can't understand the concern.
It almost created a floppy age disaster until companies, users figured it is fast, free but doesn't really find viruses! I remember F-Prot and Thunderbyte first got their name by showing the virus farm user has been living with.
The issue is simple: AV is considered an extra "utility" by MS, not their bread and butter. So basically they won't care enough like a real security company.
...that ranted about how it was unfair for M$ to tighten up their kernel/ OS? ...that introduced certificate encryption for internal comms between Symantec Corp. AV servers and clients, a system so shaky that one server could bring them all down with no fallback? ...that brought out a home AV product so top heavy they had to rewrite it from scratch once even the non-tech users cottoned on? ...that is now on its' 11th version of corporate AV, and still hasn't got it right?
Why yes, it could!
And what, use a fresh drive image every time you boot up the virtual machine?
Sure, why not? Or better yet, use an immutable drive image. E.g., in VirtualBox:
I'm sure other virtualization packages have similar features.
Actually they are just trash talking MS in the true spirit of corporate competition. It is like brushing teeth in the morning for them. You are not taken seriously as a competitor if you don't issue some form of short press conference where you can say how bad everything but your own products is.
The truth is, through my "fixing" of countless laptops ridden with Symantec products, I can honestly say, disregarding their security track record, I despise and resent their products as much as I ever could. Large, monolithic but with 10 services to get rid of, poorly uninstalling or not uninstalling at all, horrible user interfaces - at least Microsoft products are benign compared to Symantec, use FAR FEWER resources to the point where you don't notice them (but they still do the job), have usually quite well designed GUIs and remove themselves without question. Thing is, Microsoft has different divisions, and clearly divisions that work on Windows Defender, Windows OneCare Live, and now Windows Security Essentials are, by evidence, not the same division that work on builtin Windows security, although situation seems to be improving on the latter.
Symantec and those corporate benemoths have been preying on customer fear for malware, and feeding us crap for more than ten years now. There was once Peter Norton and his Norton Commander, ever since that it went downhill with all things related to him and his company. Symantec has a lot of fat around the waist now. And they are afraid Microsoft is onto them.
The whole anti-virus industry is kind of like a dysfunctional family sitcom, with Microsoft as the wacky uncle whose crazy antics ironically bring in new customers for the family business by the end of every episode. Every other season the crazy uncle threatens to leave and the kids go nuts trying to convince him he can't make it without them, but everyone knows he's going to be back by next season's premiere. This story arc is no different.
The funniest episodes are when the kids go out and try and pitch woo. They seem to think that everyone else is crazy as "Uncle Mike" and leave a trail of property damage all over town as they fail to convince Apple and Palm and everyone else that their nutty schemes are JUST what they need for success.
These threads always devolve to Symantec bashing but what I would find curious is how many of you actually have seen the latest edition? I despised NAV for years and having worked for Symantec I always used SAV (now SEP) because it was a lighter client with comparable detection.
Today almost the reverse is true. While SEP incorporates much more than AV/Spyware/Firewall it has become even more intrusive with the ability to provide all sorts of corporate level protection. NAV, on the other hand, is totally streamlined. I installed Norton 360 v3 the other day on a 5 year old computer. It took ~60 seconds to install. That's from the time I started the executable to the time of the optional restart. Boot-up had no increase in lag and the interface was completely non-intrusive. Of course if those are the only reasons you run AV then why bother?
We have Trend where I work. More than doubles Eclipse startup time. Often I open more than one workspace. Without antivirus, you can start multiple Eclipse instances in parallel at a reasonable speed. With Trend running, I think it rescans every DLL for every Eclipse instance. It's brutal to have to restart multiple workspaces after an Eclipse update, like I did today. Sometimes I think "haven't you scanned that *enough* already?" Too bad Eclipse doesn't have a "fork new workspace" option so that I could load my workspace instances on the other side of airport security.
On our machines, XP doesn't recognize TrendMicro, so we get the "running naked" DR DOS jim-bob. Reminds me that Microsoft has been in the anti-virus game a long time. One of their early efforts was called AARD.
I work in AV and tell you these:
- Stop bashing Norton, because it only shows you are 3 years behind the events. Ever since the massive rewrite for Norton 360, Symantec AV is really good again and popular and that scares smaller antivirus competitors quite enough.
- Microsoft's free security is a problem, because it makes VXers work easier. Currently there are at least three major and two dozen smaller antivirus vendors and cyber criminals have to decide whose products their malware should attack or defuse, as all at once is impractical. If Microsoft's free-beer entry clears the arena and soon there won't be more than half a dozen AV players left, it will be possible to produce malware which kills all known active protection suites in one go and wreak havoc.
- Microsoft will probably use their free AV to create artifical incompatibility with established AV vendors and drive them out of the market or buy them at reduced price. As soon as MS is king, Ballmer will make security a paid item.
Next year this time Symantec will be crying that this free software is uncompetetive and is killing their business. I'd say businesses have more bs than politicians, but since businesses own The Government(tm) that's not really a surprise.
It is a GREAT product!
The only ones bashing it are competitors. That is when you KNOW it is good.
I'll try anything once. Twice if it tastes good
If Symantec doesn't like it, that must be a point in its favor. Half the time, Symantec's shit is as bad as the malware it's supposed to be protecting you from.
So? I run Vista and I don't even run an anti-virus. No, I don't download random stuff and after being on the internets for 13 years I can navigate through all the shady stuff out there.
Competent & savvy users could always secure whatever OS people hand them. If I write a C program to delete someones /home directory (or basically any data files owned by the logged in user) and just give a Linux user the program to execute. Neither he nor Linux is capable of stopping that program from running. (once you chmod +x it .. :p)
The problem was always for the typical 'aunt' / 'mom' / 'grandma' / 'joe-6-pack' stereotype. Its slightly easier on Linux because of the repositories guaranteeing (or as close as you can get) that the user isn't installing malware. Given the billions of apps on windows, that completely breaks down. Anyone want to volunteer to pay my bandwidth bills to download all games and apps from the repositories? :p
On the other hand, most companies are either infected with WTF culture or bureaucracy or they're not. Unless they've bought up a different company, the attitude and quality procedures (or lack thereof) is usually the same.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Symantec's security products suck. They are a pain, not particularly good at finding threats, and they slow your system down. Ok well despite that, they manage to hang on because a lot of people know they need virus protection (and Windows will remind you of that fact) and Symantec has name recognition. Unfortunately some of the very best out there are from companies that people have heard of, like ESET. Also, they all cost money, just like Symantec.
So the good AV solutions probably didn't cut in to their market that much. Ya, I run NOD32 (side note, I really recommend it if you are after virus protection, it is excellent) but then I would go with no protection before I'd run Symantec. I'm not really a lost sale. They are after the non-technical user market, who know enough to know they need virus protection, but will just buy it form the first name they recognize.
Well now along comes a product from Microsoft. Can't get much better name recognition than that. What's more, it is free and what's even more it is very light weight, at least as compared to Symantec's crap. Now THAT is a problem. That could seriously cut in to their market.
Also remember this is the same Symantec that was complaining about Vista's security center as being "anti-competitive." All the Vista (and Windows 7) security center does is make sure you have anti-virus, anti-malware, a firewall, and automatic updates. If you don't it warns you. While the updates have to come from MS (or a WSUS server if you are in a domain) the rest it doesn't care about. It is quite happy with ESET Smart Security as your AV, AM, and firewall and shows a green board. So why was Symantec whiny? Because they had a similar thing, but it said you needed all Symantec software. So if you got just their AV solution, it'd tell you that you were at risk unless you bought more products. They were scared that people would look at MS's security center and go "Oh, ok, I've got what I need."
More or less if Symantec is badmouthing a product, I think it is worth my time to check out :D.
As for the product in question, we are trying it at work now. It seems to be very fast and unobtrusive. So long as its detection rate is reasonable, I'd say it's a winner for people who don't want to buy a solution.
I'd like to know what the people who make REAL AVs like Avira and Kaspersky, think of it. Symantech is completely irrelevant (only the clueless use their crap), and TrendMicro doesn't have what it takes to be given any serious attention...
Sincerely, I outright _hate_ Micoshaft, but if they will give us signatures at the end of the day for every new artifact that shows up around here trying to steal ID and account details, they win.
Besides if you want to blame anyone for the death of QEMM other than themselves, well you'd be blaming Intel. The writing was on the wall for memory managers when the 80386 came out. Protected mode meant that all that shit would no longer be necessary since apps would get flat virtual memory spaces presented to them, no segmentation or tricky BS needed. All memory would be equal.
QEMM continued to sell after memmaker came out because it did work far better. Its sales started dying with Windows, since it didn't do anything for you. Windows 95 was when it was all over.
Please remember that the conventional memory/640k thing was NOT a Microsoft creation. It was a combination of Intel and IBM. The 8088 had 20 bits of addressing, giving it 1MB of addressable memory. Now on a system, actual RAM itself isn't the only thing that needs memory addresses. Hardware, notably video memory but other things as well, need to have memory addresses to be used. So IBM divided the addressing as 640k for system RAM, 384k for other usage. At the time they made the system, this was not a problem as you couldn't get 640k of memory. Later the limit got hit.
Thus whenever you ran an Intel processor in 16-bit mode, this is how addressing was done. Still true to this day. Modern Intel and AMD CPUs boot up in 16-bit real mode and they still address memory in this fashion. However the OS boot loader switches them over to protected or long mode and then it isn't an issue.
You still can run in to similar issues though, at least on 32-bit systems. You discover that on 32-bit systems you hit the 3.something GB limit. You knock 4GB of memory in to it, yet only 3.something (the something varies) are available to the OS. Why? Hardware that uses memory mapped IO. Your video card, sound card, etc. They all need memory addresses in the 4GB space the CPU can use. As such it can't actually address all 4GB of physical RAM. Wasn't a problem for a long time as 4GB was way more addresses than a system would have RAM, but no longer.
64-bit systems don't have this problem, as they have 16 exabytes of total address space. Plenty for whatever RAM you've got, plus all the addresses for hardware. However, if in the future we ever do have computers with that much RAM, the same issue will again reappear.
Isn't Symantec and these other companies the same ones that started crying when M$ kicked barred everyone from kernel access to make a more secure OS. By default, the fact the M$ allowed them to even run on the OS made the OS less secure.
I scanned my Fedora ISO with MSE and it didn't find any threat! Is Microsoft changing attitude towards Linux?
Symantec doesn't like that Microsoft is releasing a high quality anti-virus for free? I wonder why. How... how so very odd.
It seems like the virus protection racket on the Microsoft platform for home users might be over. That must be really scary for Symantec, not having everyone by the balls.
...so it doesn't NEED malware protection. wait. that's CRAZY talk.
That sounds great. Where can I get the Linux version?
It's about time Microsoft took some responsibility for their crap OS. This should be an automatic install though.
When Symantec makes a usable product I would consider giving my worst enemy, THEN they can criticize. That company and their "software" (malware in my mind) cause far more problems than they fix, nevermind the fact some virii target their malware...I mean application
That being said, how long do you think it'll take for virus writers to target MS' app?
"The "Uninstall Windows"-posts aren't trolls, there attempts at being funny."
The internet is positively brimming with people attempting to be funny, and failing.
Until the day when there's a "-1, failed funny" mod choice, I say anything that gets them off the page is worthwhile.
We should all do our part to raise the global humour bar.
Ain't there a bunch of Windows lovers in disguise here ...
Oh, now I see. But now that her PC's sorted, you don't get to see her so often. Reinstall XP, you might get laid...
This doesn't work unless she has other motives. i.e. she wants to make someone else angry, or jealous.
Something worse could happen as well. You could be put on her 'friends' list. The list where you have no chance of ever getting between her legs. I so hate that list.
I installed to my laptop and a vb hosted by linux. The former is Vista 32bit and the latter is XPpro 32bit. Both of them seem to get a small performance boost having removed defender and avg.
My concern, however, is that when you consider the software that inspects every download or launch on your computer, well, that's the AntiVirus (AV) domain. I'm not sure I like Microsoft having a direct feed.
Is anyone watching that it's not abused?
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so let's go ahead and go there. the tinfoil conspiracy perspective would probably rest on the concept of 'absolute power corrupts to the absolute extent...'
My question is not about intent, it's about motive. I think Microsoft has a strong motive to collect statistics of what files are examined. Rolling that up to "your GUID uses iTunes on Sunday" is not a stretch.
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a clear corollary to having a direct feed of what is installed and what is used - This gives this entity control enough to allow a profile (eg. communicates over non-standard port, sends identifyable information, is uninteruptable) to be skipped.
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I'm going to keep Microsoft Security Essentials installed there, but thanklinus I can NOT run it where it matters to me.
Microsoft products have traditionally been inferior to their competitors, and have traditionally been mocked or ignored by their competitors until it became too late...
Expect to see heavy marketing and tactics like bundling etc to force the competitors out of the market, and if that happens you can pretty much expect MS to stagnate this product because it won't be a profit centre.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
Older versions of NAV used to just kill the performance of my computers, and I did have one machine that was completely trashed by installing it.
But we're running the latest corporate, managed version of Symantec at work and it's really pretty good. On my 4 year old box running Windows 7 it's only using 3 Megs of RAM. After months of use I've had no problems with it. I guess old dogs can learn new tricks after all. But I still haven't installed it at home.
Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
they'd whining about monopolies and tying. Just more marketing blather. Nothing to see here...
I've had it running since yesterday -Unobtrusive -Caught 4 virii (keylogger & trojans)missed by ESET NOD32 in software installers I had downloaded -Took about 40% longer to do a full deep scan than Nod32 -No logs showing that the scans ran when scheduled (only a list of detected problems) -Smart enough to look for virus catalog updates right before scanning -Phones home to MSFT (anonymously) with security data It seems less obtrusive running in the background watching applications & downloads than Norton 2009 did on my old computer. I haven't tried Norton 2010 (and hopefully never will) I found ESET Smart Security 4 to be buggy on Win 7 x64 (dropping the internet connection unless I disabled the firewall mini-driver) Overall, this Windows Security Essentials seems like the best option for me right now. And it's free, which is nice.
A beginners' guide to Portland, OR?
It's interesting to note, at the link the GP provided, that apparently you can still spend $49.95 for it.
So, Microsoft is a good company because they abused people only until last year?
Apple and Linux and BSD don't need such protection. Why does Windows? Because Windows has built-in vulnerabilities, apparently, and that makes more money for Microsoft. Many people buy new computers when their old ones become infected.
Symantec is just mad that MSE doesn't slowdown the computer or crash nearly as much as their own software. It also seems to work better then Symantec and Trend Micro in the area of trojans. Trend always seems to find the threats, but not actually deem them to be enough of a threat to remove...
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
Security Essentials is essentially Windows Defender with a different interface and a few enhancements. That's pretty much it.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
and I liked it.
I even participated their survey after using it for a while. The feedback I gave them? I didn't even notice it was there. THAT was the best thing about it.
Go away, Symantec. Come back when you actually have a decent product that does not get in the way of your customers.
How many hours to uninstall?
Don't use MicroSLOP
Yours In Tashkent,
Kilgore T.
MS forces you to join (their aptly named) SpyNet.
From the privacy policy:
"Choice/control: Running Microsoft Security Essentials requires you to be a member of Microsoft SpyNet"
This SpyNet automatically sends info to MS on software running on your system, apparently without any further OK.
You're confusing something that detects trojans / spyware etc. with a package that contains that, plus antivirus. Come back and leave a commend when you understand the difference.
We want to reward a behavior to encourage it. In this case it sounds like Microsoft has made a good product. What ever they did to make it good we want to reinforce. Where when they come out with Vista we want to boo and hiss them to reinforce that we don't want crap like that made.
Microsoft, Apple, Google, Amazon what's the difference? All steal money from devs and control with walled gardens.
Interesting. I've never seen that before, and I'm not sure I accept everything it implies, but it explains quite a lot about observed interactions between the sexes.
Just buying into this for the sake of argument, I believe I'd be on her friends ladder - but that's okay because everyone else on the planet is so unbeliveably below SWMBO on my ladder that they may as well not even exist. I also note that Ladder Theory doesn't seem to make allowance for things like sibling relationships, which would be important to most people outside Kentucky or Tasmania.
Of course, besides the reasons of it shipping for free, IE 4.x was a really piece of good engineering compared to Netscape 4. IE 5 shipped, Netscape was still a rival, the best IE ever for Windows, the 5.5 shipped and put the final nail to Netscape 4's coffin.
When Netscape/Mozilla were struggling, with no hope to compete, MS IE quality diminished. If this "free offer" causes windows security industry to concentrate on Enterprise, not the consumer level... It will really hurt MS in real terms, not some bad quality browser we talk about..
Speaking of not being effected by Windows, it is impossible. The first day I booted my G5 1600 Mac giving up Windows, as a Windows switcher, I tested a firewall with logging. There were thousands and thousands of port 135 hits (Blaster) effecting my browsing speed.
that's no good using microsoft product for the security record, well thank you. You just gave me the argument I need to switch my parents, buddies, girlfriend to linux.
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