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What Free Antivirus Do You Install On Windows?
Techman83 writes "After years of changing between AVG Free + Avast, it's coming time to find a new free alternative for friends/relatives who run Windows. AVG and Avast have been quite good, but are starting to bloat out in size, and also becoming very misleading. Avast recently auto updated from 4.8 to 5 and now requires you to register (even for the free version) and both are making it harder to actually find the free version. Is this the end of reasonable free antivirus, or is there another product I can entrust to keep the 'my computer's doing weird things' calls to a minimum?"
I still use Avast. Oh noes, it took me 2 minutes to fill out the little form. It takes up few resources, it has updates for it nearly every day, it's free as in beer, and I have gotten a virus in ages. What's not to like?
Living With a Nerd
Microsoft security essentials http://www.microsoft.com/security_essentials/
I mean, if anyone knows about viruses, it'd be Microsoft.
I install Microsoft Security Essentials if I have to install AV (and if it's available - only XP onwards).
Doesn't do as well as Kaspersky and some other payware ones, but does better than most of the free ones.
And is certainly less bloated than the McAfee and Symantec crap[1].
[1] Why install AV software that makes your computer behave like it's infected by loads of viruses...
fdisk works in a pinch.
I have been using Comod Internet Security. It does the Job. http://www.comodo.com/home/internet-security/free-internet-security.php
http://www.free-av.com/
Both Avast and AVG are on that site. Using there installer avoids all of the searching through six layers of pages, and it avoids all of the crapware. And you can bundle installers for multiple apps into one file. Quick and easy. You may be able to make an installer and mail it to your relatives and have them run it. I don't know though as I haven't tried it.
Microsoft Security Essentials is free, lightweight, and pretty good. Even Ars Techinca thought so, if you trust them.
I should think "friends/relatives who run Windows" would be exactly the type to appreciate the convenience of a low-impact reliable AV package, which means they may have to pay a few bucks. It's fine to play FOS yourself or with trivial office or audio stuff, and I do it myself. But I still give ESET a few shekels/year for each windows PC in my house. It just makes sense to me.
.nosig
http://www.clamwin.com/
Although it is missing an on access scan, I am not sure if that is a plus of a minus.
If I were God, wouldn't I protect my churches from acts of me?
Avira Anti-vir. It is good, fully functioned with updates, custom scheduled scans and on access scanning. The only thing you have to deal with is a daily ad that you can dismiss by hitting OK and it won't pop up for another 24 hours. Also it uses up half the resources of AVG, McAfee, Norton.
You always had to register for the free version of Avast, and re-register every six months.
Obviously you've never actually used Avast. You've always had to register for the free version, and renew the regsitration once a year. They're giving it away for free, I honestly don't see registering as a big deal.
And the new version is actually a lot better, it finally detects rootkits... If you're looking for something that actually does its job and yet doesn't take up any space or processing power, I doubt you'll find anything...
If you're gonna pay for your operating system, and then complain about free antiviruses, you might want to consider changing to linux...
Thank you so much!
I had no idea there were other operating systems!
Comodo has always had a wonderful firewall, and lately I have been thinking of trying their AV for my less than tech savvy relatives on windows. Avast has bothered me lately with their voice updates, though generally I still like Avast. AVG is the only one I think is not so good.
meep
Techman83 writes "...AVG and Avast have been quite good, but are starting to bloat out in size..."
Um, in case you haven't noticed, more viruses, exploits and malware are coming out all the time.
I'd be very surprised if ANY antivirus software got smaller.
In fact, I'd be highly suspicious.
Beta sux! Join the Slashcott! http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4760465&cid=46173047
I use Avast on my workhorse machine and MS Security Essentials on my netbook. I feel like Avast does more, but is a resource hog, so only use it on my heftier machine. Both are running XP.
"Knowledge is of two kinds: we know a subject ourselves or we know where we can find information." -Samuel Johnson
Excellent [buy v1agra] product. I haven't have any malware [|\|iger1an 419] detected since I installed it [install Antivirus 2009 today!].
I've been trying this out on my home computers so far and its definitely less resource intensive than previous AV solutions I've used. I haven't gotten infected with anything lately (that I know of) so I don't know how well it handles infections yet.
Actual web page is here and you can read up on it a bit here.
There are quite a few options actually. I'll list them in order of effectiveness.
1. BSD or Linux. You won't get hit by viruses or any crap like that, unless you're enough of a moron to run everything as root and go out of your way to make the system open. Unfortunately neither option will run 100% of your Windows software.
2. Unplug your Windows box. Guaranteed 100% effective. The drawback is that apps won't run. ;)
3. Comodo antivirus; http://personalfirewall.comodo.com/free-download.html I have been trying it on various workstations and have found it to be reasonably good. Less effective than the above options! ;) Seriously though it's pretty good. It's not antispyware though, and it doesn't slow the system to a crawl like some other programs. That should be a non-issue. If not, then why are you running MSIE after you've been warned for years? ;)
4. Microsoft Security Essentials: Microsoft actually did a very good job with this basic suite. It's not bloated at all, is straight and to the point, and catches some spyware even malwarebytes misses. It's good now, but then again, Microsoft has dropped the ball with every antivirus and antispyware software they have installed to date.
5. You could try Norton Internet Security. I understand they've completely rearchitected it and brought over NO legacy code and are not bloated so you might want to try it, but I haven't looked at the Norton suite since the 2003 version that turned their antivirus into a failed abortion.
I was using Moon Secure on various systems for a while: it's free, open source, etc. but it has not been updated in forever and is rapidly becoming less and less effective, plus it has quite a few defects including making the Windows logon process EXTREMELY slow on some configurations.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
none, I prefer my operating system without a condom. It's more fun that way :). I also stripe without parity (mainly because I don't care what happens to my windows installations).
I've used Spybot S&D since my XP days. I like it, but I don't know how much cred it has with other people.
Comodo gives you firewall and anti-virus in one package, and I have been using it for a couple of years.
The antivirus you recommend is not compatible with the video games that I play or the IDE that I program in.
At work (a university) the central IT has chosen to license Sophos. It is, well, crap to put it mildly and takes up amazing amounts of resources. So, instead we use Security Essentials on many systems. Works well, it has successfully stopped viruses that users have tried to get. Pretty light on resources over all, not the lightest weight program I've seen but up there.
Best one for free I've seen. Personally ESET NOD32 is my favourite and what I license for home, but if the price requirement is $0, then MSE is what I use.
Seriously, no antivirus. But then, I only use Windows occasionally to play games. I'm surprised I only had one (1) virus problem over the last 5 years in Windows, which I fixed thanks to a targeted tool. Apart from that, I practice Safe Computing, and that appears to have kept me out of trouble.
However, for all that I know, my windows system may be part of a few botnets that don't cause me any problems :\
On my family's computers... I forced Ubuntu upon those I could, and left the others to fend for themselves.
Misleading titles? Inflammatory blurbs? Keep in mind that Slashdot is a tabloid.
It's analogous to chain mail armor; it's effective against old weapons like broadswords and crap, but completely useless against guns. Today's malware are the equivalent of heavy artillary and most antivirus software is akin to chain mail or even leather armor.
Or, to put it in a car analogy: many antivirus programs would be like wiping a coat of mineral oil ("baby oil") on your unpainted/freshly sandblasted car, and then driving your car through the winter in New England where they salt the roads very heavily. You're hoping the car will still be nice and shiny come April, but sorry, the body is totally rust-covered and has been perforated in several spots.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Used it for years. God help me if they ditch the old URL I'll have to start googling it.
http://housecall.antivirus.com/
"(I) have this unfortunate condition that causes me not to believe a single thing any politician says when a mic's on.
I would recommend either Avira http://www.freeav.com/ or M$ Security Essentials.
A while ago I read some link off Slashdot that compared the CPU/RAM usage of various virus scanners. Avira was at or near the top on all the tests. My use of it seems to validate that.
Security Essentials is a Microsoft product so I figure they know all or most of the tricks of their own OS to make it reasonably low on resource usage which it seems to be. It also has no nag screens which is nice.
http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2009/09/first-look-microsoft-security-essentials-impresses.ars
An in-depth look at Microsoft Security Essentials, it made me decide to try it out on my girlfriend's laptop (I run OS X myself) and it's worked great.
The interactive way to Go -- http://www.playgo.to/iwtg/en/
there.
you're gonna get a lot of this here. so let's get this out of the way, shall we ?
now, if you REALLY need to run some kinds of windows apps, since your computer probably came with windows already, no need to put it to waste. move it to a virtual machine with sun's excellent virtual box, plus fork some more cash for crossover office.
here at my job, I got fed up with windows, so after the company replaced our old notebooks by newwer dual core machines, i moved to linux, office (i can't get rid of outlook yet.) runs on crossover, some proprietary tools run on windows xp inside virtual box, that i fire up only when needed.
the good thing about virtual machines is that you can make snapshots. create a snapshot of yours right after installing windows. then use it whenever you need, just be carefull not to open anything funny, avoid using a browser inside it. even if all these precautions you get infected, discard the current state and boot the last clean snapshot.
everything else, run on the linux host. this way you don't need an anti-virus any better than microsoft's own.
i never used any virtualization solution on macs, but if vmware's fusion product is anything like the windows/linux counterpart, it certainly have similar functionality.
What ? Me, worry ?
What Free Antivirus Do You Install On Windows?
GNU/Linux, of course.
So change your IDE & program your own games for Linux, problem solved! :-)
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
I was recently introduced to this, and it pleasantly surprised me. It's lightweight, and it's rated well. Pretty much the only packages that have better detection rates is payware, and this beats the payware in false positives. Also, the interface is easy to understand, and it stays out of the way.
Linux :)
I don't mean that in the snarky, "everyone should only use Linux" sense. But my Linux computers are certainly the ones that require the least care and feeding. And Linux is free.
Really, TANSTAAFL.
That said:
Avast Free has always required you to register.
I have been using it for years and recommend it to all my clients.
In Avast 5, the registration process is easier than ever.
For one, on access scanning is generally considered pretty important. Ideally you want your AV program to act as a filter, making sure that nothing gets on it in the first place. After all if you system gets infect, it could well shut down the scanner. So just scheduled scans is only so useful. You really want to scan files as they come in to the computer.
Then there's the fact that Clam seems to do pretty poorly in AV tests. If you look at Wikipedia you find that it is bombing many of them rather hard. While no virus scanner is perfect, it seems to be significantly below its peer group.
avast kept popping up ads to buy their stuff.
switched to avira, no popups. similar number of false positives as avast... i saw no difference between them. but really, who knows if they're working.
is there a way to evaluate antivirus software? i mean, after it's 1.) no popups, 2.) not bloaty 3.) easy on the system 4.) convenient to use... how do you know if it actually works?
I mean I could write a system tray app that's a "virus checker". and always tells you your system's ok... haha
anyway, reading around, seemed like avast, avira, and avg were the best free ones. and after running avg and avast, I liked avira. but really, no idea who's the best.
music - http://www.subatomicglue.com
Why do they make you download it?
- it's to preserve their "partners'" (Symantec & company) market
If MS was really, truly concerned about keeping malware off your PC, there'd be a free AV program installed when you got your PC, with automatic updates. // don't mind me, I run Linux, because I'm fed up with MS. // kids have switched to Apples for the same reason.
But that would kill the market for independent AV software. And MS isn't really concerned about malware, except when it influences their profits. MS is certainly not concerned about the quality of your computing experience unless it involves you not purchasing any more MS products.
- I let windows check for updates, but install them manually.
- I mostly download my software from sourceforge / cygwin's mirrors (yes, I'm risking that those could be compromised).
I haven't noticed anything fishy yet, and my WoW account hasn't been hacked in 5 years :-)
www.ubuntu.com Been using it for years and no viruses yet.
Avira get's my vote. Low resource use, high detection rate, and free for personal use. What more could you ask for? Since it is freeware the default installation has some nag screens, but those are easily disabled. http://www.elitekiller.com/files/disable_antivir_nag.htm
I always found Avira Antivir personal edition very very good for detections. relatively lightweight but it does come with a nag window every once in a blue moon which can easily be turned off.
Microsoft Security Essentials. It's really the only choice imo. All the others are trying to sell you something. Now, if you're willing to pay, there are perhaps better choices. The most important thing to remember is to not take it too awful seriously. All AV sucks, badly. It's reactive and it only detects a small percentage of the naughty things. It's the only option, but it sucks. MSSE is good.
Imagine if you weren't allowed to use roads because a bus company complained about your driving 3 times. --skunkpussy
At some point, I got fed up with running anti-virus software on my Windows XP PC. The benefits never appeared to outweigh the hassle. And AV software IS a hassle.
After a year, I can't see any downside to this.
Note that I'm a smart computer user who keeps everything patched and up to do, as well as knows how to configure a hardware router/firewall.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't Avast required free registration for Avast Home for quite a while?
No one cares what your captcha was
Houston TX, USA
I think your first analogy is more apt.
Anti-virus may not protect against the 'heavy artillery' style attacks, but it does protect against the millions of older ones.
Naturally, just like the Marine Corps can't protect people directly from shelling, it can protect them against some of the small arms fire, random bits of flying debris, and (most importantly) help keep them in contact with their command structure.
Running a computer with no AV exposes you not just to massive malware, it exposes you to everything. It's nice to at least get an alert "Hi, program XYZ is attempting to send emails. Is this ok?" It also provides information back to the vendors (or should) regarding the most commonly found attacks.
Just because you can't be 100% safe with any given product is no reason to abandon it entirely. You should still wear pants even though they don't stop bullets :)
An operating system should be like a light switch... simple, effective, easy to use, and designed for everyone.
I have been using PC-Tools Antivirus lately with good results. It seems to do the job very well while not killing my cpu time and memory/io.. Its also free and the license doesn't prevent using it for commercial use. You can get it from pack.google.com as well. If you need a version that'll install on Win2k3 server or higher, it'll need to come right from pctools.com.. The pack.google.com version is only for XP/Vista/7. Just my 2cents.
"I know this... this is a unix system" -- Jurrasic Park
I use AVG's free edition for on-access scanning, just for a little extra protection, because I am generally able to avoid getting infected with anything. (Even if something does slip by me, I can often track it down through a service it installs, entry in startup lists, or running processes.)
If I'm downloading something that has a big potential for being a virus (e.g. a no-CD crack), I'll scan it manually with AVG, and also upload it to a scanning service like virusscan.jotti.org or virustotal.com, which take a file and put it through a number of anti-virus products.
Natually, AVG has also been making it harder to find the free edition. They, of course, want you to buy the full AVG Internet Security package. (To find AVG Free, you have to go to free.avg.com, and look for the less-flashy, more hidden buttons.)
Between my job, some side work and friends and family I manage close to 70 Windows machines. I have been doing IT since 1992.
When I am asked this question my answer is always this. None. I think antivirus is more trouble than it is worth. First any new viruses will be undetected, second the pain of actually running anti virus outweighs any marginal benefit received from it.
Of course this answer immediately creates a follow up question... Well then what do you do?
The best way to protect yourself is to run as NON - ADMIN. That's it. A coworker recently got a virus and I simply logged in as admin and ran a free online virus scan. It found his problem and removed it.
http://p8ste.com - Web based Clipboard
Web accelerator is nothing more than a cacheing proxy. install a proxy to replace it.
emulators, sorry, but bothand more are available under linux.
flash works fine.
Opera 10 - dont know I dont use it.
Realplayer-- WHY? Who cares?
Ipod mp4 video works perfectly fine. did you even try?
Sorry but 80% of all your claims have not been true for 2 or more years now, and some are simply forever false. I've played SNES games under linux for over 10 years now.
I can add to your list that Linux will run IE6 and IE7 AND IE8 fine under wine. as well as REalplayer if you really want that.
I'll try opera 10 tonight, but I suspect it will work perfectly under Ubuntu 9.10.
Oh I can also play WMA and WMV files as well as other non linux file formats.
P.S. I'm really sad for you, having to live with a Dialup ISP must suck. You cant get broadband at all? no WISP service? How about CDMA?
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
It's also the whole monopoly thing. They got into big trouble for bundling a free browser into windows. Because, I mean, what OS actually comes with a browser? (Of course things were a little different in 1995.)
Can you construct some sort of rudimentary lathe?
Tm
Support TBI Research: http://www.raisinhope.org
I know we keep getting further and further off topic here, but I can't resist.
Atari and Nintendo emulators are the only ones I run on my Ubuntu box (z26, Fceu, Mupen64Plus, Zsnes). Adobe Flash works fine (on a 32-bit computer anyhow, though I hear you can run the 32-bit plugin passably on 64-bit). Pretty much all of my videos are in MP4 format. The Dialup one I will give you, and I can't speak about your Opera problem (come to think of it, doesn't Opera 10 have a built-in accelerator?). When was the last time you tried Ubuntu?
Funny may not give karma, but +5 Informative never made anyone snort coffee out their nose.
Those web accelerators are hokey BS anyway.
Many games run well in WINE - what game are you specifically trying to run?
There are plenty of Atari and Nintendo emulators for Linux
Flash runs in Linux, although admittedly it's a major resource hog compared to Flash for Windows
Don't know about Opera 10. I'm happy with Firefox myself.
RealPlayer - who the heck uses that any more?
MP4 video - Um, there's probably 10 different ways to play this back in Linux, definately 2 ways without any doubt. Most common are mplayer and xine.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
... the mythical "Year of Linux on Desktop" will NEVER come.
You know, that self-righteous "fuck your needs - if you don't have the common sense to use Linux you are a fucking moron anyway"-approach to tech support.
The guy asks nicely for advice on pest control for his apples (and probably his families', colleagues', customers'...), and he gets "Apples suck. Plant oranges. Or tangerines. Or lemons. Or some other citrus fruit."
Do you also go around telling vegetarians how hamburgers are much better than lattice?
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
I run a network of -- well, it peaked at 70 XP SP3 workstations on a domain.
IE(7) is hidden and FF3.0 or 3.5 on all desktops, with AdBlock Pro.
Spybot 1.6 Teatimer in startup.
Users are all non-administrator under domain control.
In almost a year -- with *no* AV realtime at all -- we got bit exactly once, by Antivirus2009. Spot manual scans come up clean, done with a current Windows
Ultimate Boot CD. No untoward flows seen out through the firewall.
It may not be *about* viruses, anymore, per se, guys...
More likely, they don't want to find themselves with another antitrust suit from the western governments.
Oh please - that's just trolling.
There are Atari, Commodore, NES, SNES, Sega, and a variety of other emulators (and MAME). :)
Flash has worked on Linux for ages. It's been out so long, it's even on PC-BSD by default.
Opera 10 is available for Linux and BSD. Try their download page, and I confirmed it installs on Debian. http://www.opera.com/browser/download/?custom=yes
Never tried RealPlayer. Can't help there
Ipod-encoded MP4/AAC non-encypted works fine with handbrake and other such apps.
There are plenty of reasons not to use Linux (preference, look and feel, specific games, photoshop, etc) but most of these aren't it.
An operating system should be like a light switch... simple, effective, easy to use, and designed for everyone.
I use ClamAV and now they have Windows client. http://www.clamav.net/
Mileage always vary. You may have speedier machine, a new one, or your client may be trying to get the last drop of juice from his 8-years-old Windows XP box. It may need to remove virus more often or will be better with a more reliable real-time detection. I suggest you to go to AV-Comparatives. They make nice (sometimes clever) tests and publish really extensive reports about them. Their tests are not limited to effectiveness (like the ability to detect viruses), but also to other aspects, as performance(meaning how AV affects system performance) or even "corporate reviews". Surprisingly to me, MS Security Essentials is doing quite well, according to their tests. Maybe an option for clueless users, as it's easy to use and nice to the system.
This comment may contain speech figures. Reader discretion is advised.
Always used AVG -even tho I have to admit it has gone a bit crazy lately. My suggestion -get a Mac.
Death comes to those who wait.
Avira AntiVir - http://www.free-av.com/ --- free version. It scores high on all independent tests and isn't crazy about hogging your resources or slowing your machine to a crawl.
Not that most people care, but Real does make a version of RealPlayer that installs via an .RPM file on their web site.
MalwareBytes has been effective for the few WinXP boxes I have to deal with.
http://www.malwarebytes.org/
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
Just because you can't be 100% safe with any given product is no reason to abandon it entirely.
I recently reinstalled Windows, and while I've historically used Avast, I opted to go with nothing this time around. I'm tired of resource usage and slower load times for everything thanks to antivirus; I've moved my e-mail to Google Apps, so they scan my e-mails for viruses. My use of Bittorrent is extremely limited (I only have it installed because Star Trek Online's installer is available via torrent), and I never visit the seedier side of the internet. I'm behind a firewall.
Basically I'm not going to get a virus, so I see no reason to run anti-virus software. Rather than "Can't be 100% safe, may as well not use it", my reasoning is "I'm already 99.99999% safe, so why bother".
(Yes, I know it's still technically possible to get a virus. But the chances are extremely slim, given the way I use my computer.)
I understand that a lot of free virus are installed second on windows.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Windows Update.
And stop clicking "Yes" to everything.
That's all you need.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
I use Windows Antivirus 2009.
I reject your reality and substitute my own.
There, fixed that for you.
I've found that anti-virus software is almost always more annoying than malware. In almost every instance the performance cost of anti-virus software quickly out weight the time it takes me to restore from a backup image.
I've found this to be true of any software package (commercial or otherwise) that does on access scanning, which without on-access scanning theres no point to use the software for me since our servers can handle background scheduled scans using clam.
I guess you could say I use clam running on FreeBSD accessing files via SMBFS on my Windows machines.
With the exception of the BootCamp partition I have for gaming, my personal Windows instances are all VMs with lots of snapshots that I can roll back to should I come to a problem. Its just easier for me to use snapshots and virtual machines than to deal with av software. I have a method of creating new snapshot thats relatively safe (restore to a known good snapshot, install updates/known safe new software, immediately shut down and take a snapshot to work from in the future.
AV would be easier, but all the time I spend waiting on compiles because the retarded AV software has to scan ever binary I make and probably is retarded enough to scan all the source files each access to just makes it too inefficient for my tastes.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Which antivirus package do you infect Windows with?
I don't see how the topic of different OSes relates to the topic of AV on a specific OS.
It's free and works well.
- Atari or Nintendo emulators - Flash - Opera 10 (refuses to install) - RealPlayer - Ipod-encoded (MP4) video
Huh? So really, you can do everything besides "games" and your dialup ISP. Linux isn't ready for the 2000 AOL desktop.
You run it by getting set up with Lazarus. There is also Free Pascal for you. Both have good Delphi capabilities. GPC has merits, too. So you do have options if you were working on an electronic health records system.
Someone has to "save your nation", in both senses. Why not you? Follow the Good $RANDOMCOLORGROUP Road with your hands, not just your pie hole.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
http://www.cloudantivirus.com/en/
I was looking for something better than MSSE for my wife's mothers PC. Her dad tends to stick to AVG (I'd rather him use something else but whatever)... I found the Panda Cloud AV after googling around wasting time. The reviews I've read are pretty positive, with some hick-ups listed in the forums but that's to be expected as it's a "Beta" and mostly related to UI.
Another question I have about Free AV... has anyone found one that will work on a Server version of Windows? I have a small box that is running Server 2003 downloaded via Dreamspark, it's mostly just for fooling around with not actual server server roles. Every AV, even free, will refuse to install on it unless it's a Corp or Enterprise edition. Problem is, I don't have a ton of boxes I need a Corp or Enterprise edition on, and you can only get those versions of AV in 6 or more license packs for a pretty hefty chuck of cash. I will say I didn't try to install the Cloud AV yet, but I doubt it will work either. This machine doesn't have internet access unless I have it bridged via my laptop, it's mainly for just my internal lan use. Can anyone provide any feedback there?
What is this Windows of which you speak??? All joking aside, if it is just going to be used by me, I use ClamWin (www.clamwin.org). If my wife or anyone else is going to use it (the less "aware" folks in my life, I tend to go with something a little more thorough like Avast (albeit slower and a little more bloated.... thats even a little redundant). Avast has served me very well in the past, and would use it at the drop of a hat.
This is the one I use and reccomend to my not so tech savvy friends. It's very simple to use, free (for the basic version, which includes everything but scheduled scanning), and doesn't require registration. Its the only thing that got rid of that annoying fake windows security virus, so I've been really happy with it. www.malwarebytes.org
>>>Install a linux of some sort
Yep. And then I won't be able to run:
- My Dialup ISP (the dialup is okay but the web accelerator refuses to run)
web accelerator is an image compressor and is lame, so is dialup. If you really must, you can use a cache proxy instead.
- Games
You can get many games to run on Linux.
- Atari or Nintendo emulators
There are a lot of emulators for Linux
- Flash
There is flash for linux
- Opera 10 (refuses to install)
Never had a problem installing opera.
- RealPlayer
There is real player for linux
- Ipod-encoded (MP4) video
You can use ffmpeg with kino.
Yep that has always been my biggest complaint with Avast and Antivirus applications in general. I have no problem doing so on my computer, but it took me a long time to train my relatives not to enter personal information into random popups (or worse credit card info for the commercial options). I don't want to subvert that work now. Does anyone know of a reasonably priced product that I can reauthorize from my own computer, without it nagging the user? I am imagining getting an email when one of the subscriptions I manage is due to expire. Then I would go to a website where I can view the status of each subscription (when it expires, what version they are running, when it last updated it virus definitions, etc), and pay to renew. Options for emails when a computer has not been updated in a long time would be nice too.
Even better than fdisk: Microsoft Virtual PC.
Create a VM and stash away clones of the files it creates.
Browse the web in the VM with no protection. If it ever gets hosed by malware, just overwrite the VM files with the clones you made, and start over.
What could be simpler? Of course, it's not for my 73 year old mom...
"No matter how cynical you get, it is impossible to keep up." -- Lily Tomlin
I use Microsoft Security Essentials for my Windows 7 and Windows XP boxes, and use clam for windows 2003
Rob
ClamAV is using Amazons EC2 Cloud. Real-time (upon execution) scanning, scanning on install, and scanning on service startup, as well as removal/quarantine. You do have to be connected however for the hash and heuristics checks to work. But best practices are much better than any AV any day. Don't use IE, don't run as admin, it is that simple: http://richrumble.blogspot.com/2006/08/anti-admin-vs-anti-virus.html -rich
I just uninstalled AVG 8.x yesterday. I just want an virus scan software that I can keep on my system, and either manually scan a selected file on demand or occasionally scan a partition or the entire computer. I certainly don't want software that is running all of the time and using resources to snoop on my e-mail or scan every download. I supposedly have all of that extra snooping disabled in AVG. Yet I was appalled by all of the AVG processes that were running in the background, and further disgusted that they couldn't even be terminated in Task Manager (when I did try to terminate then it seemed two more started for every one that I tried to kill).
So this is an interesting thread, I would sure like to find something that can be run on demand but otherwise doesn't waste cpu and memory resources when not needed. So far have not found it yet, and it is depressing that this topic isn't leading to any good choices.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
I installed the free version of AVG but uninstalled it because I started getting annoying pop-ups from the program asking me to purchase the full version. Which made absolutely no sense to me since one of the the programs functions is specifically to prevent those annoying pop-ups. It didn't instill much confidence in their product.
- pick the most expensive, on the basis that it will have made the biggest investment in "getting it right"
- pick any one at random, then select the reviews which show you've made the best choice
- pick the cheapest
If you're a doctor, you'd probably go for the first approach, if you're of the religious persuasion I'd expect you to plumb for the second and if you just want to get on with your wor, the third.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
I have tried them all, I swear. Paid and free. And ALL of them annoyed me to no end, either with nagging, or slow-downs, or with pop-ups, or (shudder) VOICES that actually spoke out every freakin' time it updated its database...
Until I tried Microsoft Security Essentials. Not only does it work as well or better than most of the others (paid or free), it's less of a resource hog, and doesn't nag or get in my face. It does it's job and says out of the way otherwise.
I've NEVER been truly happy with an anti-virus package before. I'm kinda shocked that it's Microsoft's that I ended up being happy with, but that's the truth. I have since ripped out every other anti-virus on every other PC I use, home and at work, and use MSE exclusively now.
- Spryguy
There are three kinds of people in this world: those that can count and those that can't
Same here - I never thought I'd say that I trust a Microsoft security product on my personal systems but I've steadily been making the switch across my network and I am satisfied. I've also found it capable of detecting malware that was missed by AVG during a cleanup of a friend's computer.
A friend recommended it to me. It’s called Zebu/Linus or something like that. I forgot. Something with a cow and a penguin... weirdly. ;)
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
HTH.
Deleted
I'm trying another cloud based protection: Immunet http://www.immunet.com/. This probably one of the best uses I've heard for cloud computing. If a new virus is found, the signature is instantly loaded to the cloud so it can protect everyone else using Immunet immediately. You don't have to download signatures.
You can also run this WITH another checker like AVG.
If you've never been modded as "flamebait" or "troll," you've never tried to argue a minority viewpoint here!
People have criticised the site and the report. I'll agree that nothing is perfect but it's the best I've seen.
http://www.av-comparatives.org/images/stories/test/summary/summary2009.pdf
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
We run AVG, clamwin (weekly scheduled run), and adaware on my wife's M$ XP Pro box.
We liked AVG and ad-aware enough that we started giving them the money, and switched from free to paying for the licences.
***
For my Debian box, I have clamav that I built from source code, and scan my box from time to time just for fun. It has never been compromised by virii, far as I know. I run it as an unpriviledged user, and sudo as needed for administrative tasks.
Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
just like the Marine Corps can't protect people directly from shelling, it can protect them against some of the small arms fire, random bits of flying debris
Another effective way not to be shelled, shot, or hit by debris is to stay out of war zones. This is one of the ways in which suburban dwellers can justify not wearing body armor (except those living in Gary Indiana). Similarly, I choose not to use a virus scanner either because I find it cumbersome, and a poor performance to safety ratio.
It's nice to at least get an alert "Hi, program XYZ is attempting to send emails Is that nice? I find that when my computer constantly questions me about what I am trying to do, I can become annoyed. For instance, I much prefer my Debian based systems that don't generate a pop-up every time one of my programs tries to make an incoming tcp port live.
You should still wear pants even though they don't stop bullets
I guess it's your turn to make an unsuitable analogy (perhaps the emoticon indicates you were doing so purposefully, I can't tell). Not all people should wear pants. Those who should wear them do so because it because (a) it's cold, (b) social pressures encourage modesty in some venues, or (c) local laws or dress codes sometimes require them. None of those has to do with safety. Virus checkers, unlike pants, don't really have any upsides beyond the supposed safety factors - don't pretend that any AV software is nearly as versatile as a comfortable pair of jeans.
Is dial-up even fast enough to get modern viruses? :P
Adobe Flash works fine (on a 32-bit computer anyhow, though I hear you can run the 32-bit plugin passably on 64-bit)
The 64-bit flash alpha works well, too.
Clamwin http://www.clamwin.org/ virusscanner with ClamSentinel http://clamsentinel.sourceforge.net/ that provides on-access scanning. It works wonders for me!
Microsoft Security Essentials is all you need for non-enterprise A/V.
It's free, it's unobtrusive and it works very well. What's more, commercial AV vendors, like Symantec, realise what a threat it is to their business model and have published a lot of FUD about you get what you pay for - however all the benchmarks I've seen have it ranking up there with the best of them.
The only reason to go for a commercial AV package is if you need a management and reporting console to manage a large number of computers.
Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne
all hail hypnotoad.
I check the scored on Virus Bulletin http://www.virusbtn.com/vb100/archive/results?display=summary and AV Comparitives http://www.av-comparatives.org/images/stories/test/summary/summary2009.pdf to get the best available. I have used Avast! for years with great success, and recently started using Microsoft Security Essentials, both of which are VB100 rated. I like the small footprint of the new MS offering, and the fact that it has such a high detection and low false-positive rating. So far so good, even on my in-laws' laptop.
Avast has always required a registration key, and is now easier than ever to do-- you just click the button from within the program and it does it.
As for good free AV, theres Avira, Avast, and MSSE, all of which are decent. More to the point, antivirus is the LEAST important thing you can do for friends and family-- FIRST, install firefox, update IE, uninstall Adobe Reader, and install foxit. This will prevent 100x more viruses than any AV will.
How about extend this question to firewalls..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
You know they are just trying to beat out the free ones.. Once the free ones are gone they will target pay versions... then wipe them out and start charging.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
If MS was really, truly concerned about keeping malware off your PC, there'd be a free AV program installed when you got your PC,
And a complimentary anti-trust case against them to boot.
Previous versions of Avast also required registering but they would send the key string usually in a few minutes of registration. I used it up until my ISP offered a commercial version for free. My whole family uses computers but none want to be bothered with running scans or updating antispyware so they have the free commercial version. It does slow the machines down a little but they are no longer bothered with having to do tasks as they are done in the background. If I get a virus on the systems then I may go back to avast but for now Symantec is ok.
Well, that is certainly a choice. Using a firewall for example provides you with a much safer neighborhood - though it's still only 3 blocks from the warzone ;)
Not sure if you check your firewall logs regularly, but I see dozens of port scans and intrusion attempts on my firewall every day.
Regarding the pants? Yes, that was intended to be humorous. Obviously nudists and several cultures dispense with pants entirely. Still sucks when you sit on a rough park bench though :D
An operating system should be like a light switch... simple, effective, easy to use, and designed for everyone.
It is my opinion that it is always a good idea to have more than one protection product on a M$ PC, as some malware may not be detected on any one particular product.
Just thought was worth mentioning.
Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
AVG - I use to have people use this, but it was not protection people, most of them got viruses that AVG couldn't find.
Avira - Better than AVG, do custom install, may need to change some options.
Avast - Better than AVG, do custom install, may need to change some options. Talking is annoying . . .
Winclam(clamAV) - file scanner only, Its ok. Good as a 2nd protection measure. I use (clamav) on my firewall for all FTP/HTTP traffic.
Panda Cloud Antivirus - Haven't worked with it much, but I know panda AV has been a solid performer in AV for quite some time.
The best based on experience (and always do well in tests) is either trendmicro or kaspersky. Yes, they cost money, but $20 is well worth it. I feel bad when I fix peoples PC's using their products, and leave them with some free AV in hopes it keeps them clean. At least I suggest they buy one of those two products for better protection.
The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive
I had the same question two weeks ago, and www.av-comparatives.org helped tremendously by providing comprehensive comparisons of free options such as Avira, Comodo, AVG, MSE and Avast in detection, proactive protection, performance and all-around usefulness. Depending on which of these you value most, I am sure their report summaries can be useful for you.
So change your IDE & program your own games for Linux
So I've programmed the game. Now what models, textures, maps, and audio do I put into it? And to whom can I distribute copies of a Linux-exclusive game for a fee in order to pay my rent and food while I program the next game?
Okay, so I gave a slightly over-simplistic precis of the task at hand... I can take that as a criticism! :-)
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
It's also the whole monopoly thing. They got into big trouble for bundling a free browser into windows. Because, I mean, what OS actually comes with a browser? (Of course things were a little different in 1995.)
In 1995, the two main alternatives to Windows - OS/2 and MacOS - both came with browsers.
2 comments.. the first one will respond to your post. The 2nd comment will get all sorts of flames. 1. Panda Cloud Anti-Virus is pretty nice. It's pretty lightweight, kinda does its own thing and doesn't get in the way. I've had relatively good success with it. It has cause the internet to stop working one computer.. but a restart fixed it. 2. No Anti-Virus. Here's the deal.. these days most things aren't even stopped by a great, full featured anti-virus prior to get infected. Sure.. it'll catch some things or some parts of a virus, but in the end you'll still be infected and still need to have the computer cleaned off. They aren't worth the hassle any more in my opinion. They slow stuff down, don't catch 90% of what's out there and if you're not stupid.. you don't need one. I've been running about 10 PCs around my house for a good 10 years and have never once been infected with anything (and.. just for fun I've ran full scans with stuff before.. never once found anything). Anti-Virus is overrated. No matter if your'e talking your 90 year old grandma or yourself.. in the end, if someone gives a virus/spyware access/allow it to be installed.. it's going to bypass an AV anyway and the PC will be infected.
I've used Comodo's free Home & Home Office products
You're talking as if you only get virus while actively looking for them.
Oblivion Awaits
I used to run the same way. only problem i ever ran into was a counter strike map i dled off a popular site, had some sort of winrar exploit apparently. installed some crap.
I'm basically in the same boat as you. I never run anything I don't actively go out and get. This simple rule has kept me virus free for 10 years, running win2k and Vista in the last couple of years, no antivirus or firewall (most of the time)
I realise anyone with any kind of technical nouce could probably hack my machine, but I've been surfing and downloading and using the internet for that long, and have had no deleterious effects. I did get a virus on my win2k box about 10 years ago (I think it was actually from a file from a friend, but it's been that long that I don't remember), it corrupted a few files and was pretty easily removed - a couple of hours. IIRC, I did have antivirus active scanning on at the time. I have saved hours and hours by not dealing with antivirus at all since.
Basically, my advice to people who are relatively savvy is not to bother with antivirus. Once antivirus detects anything, it's generally too late. AV can be useful for people who have _no_ clue, but they're bound to get infected anyway sooner or later.
Eep! Should I call the police myself, or ... wait, who's at the door? (&(*@ofiw9* [signal lost]
Use this Screenshot of my web browser as a reference for programs to install and I personally guarantee you'll never have another virus again.
Loading...
A business publically distancing themselves from the Scientology cult and no longer being connected, are two different things.
The Scientology cultists are all about *money*, so if a "church" connection is detrimental, they would probably try to hide it. That's the way cults are.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
No, I'm talking as if you only get viruses by downloading random crap from unknown places. (Also by using thumb drives that have touched public computers, but I don't do that either.)
I used to think this way as well. Although, I had a virus scanner installed for scanning downloads, I did not have it actively scanning. Turns out my thinking was as flawed as yours. The problem is that with one vulnerability in your web browser or a browser plugin, malicious code can be executed and that code may run a bunch of detectable viruses. This exact problem happened to me when I was surfing the internet checking out some information on a game I was interested in. Randomly out of nowhere my computer started crawling and upon loading task manager I saw tons of processes spawning. (I shut down promptly and fixed using another computer.) After all was said and done it turned out whatever the exploit was had installed a bunch of different viruses. It was a very interesting attack that I had never expected, just as you have not.
This of course assumes that you browse the internet, which I assume you do.
Actually, it's more like a siege engine, with the first line of defense being whether the user chooses whether or not to open the gates. Of course, the user controls whether to open and shut the gates...
Of course, even if the gates are closed, the siege engine may still break through the wall via a security hole.
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
Take your pick. Microsoft Security Essentials used to be OneCare (now free), Avira has had a decent free offering for years.
"I've spent my whole life figuring out crazy ways to do things. It'll work." -- Montgomery Scott, "Relics"
"both are making it harder to actually find the free version"
Yeah, http://free.avg.com/ is really difficult.
I personally use MSE now because AVG started getting a little bloated before 9.0 came out.
Well, while that isn't entirely true, I gotta give that it's the most common way of infection. But since I can't give an example out of my head of auto-installers or something similar, I will simply agree. No need to argue, anyway. That said; i still believe the worst offender are relatives using your computer. Something will always end up wrong.
Oblivion Awaits
Tried the free version once. It gave me a nag screen after updates. I switched back to Avast the next day. I think I'm going to try MSE next, based on recommendations from other comments.
Short story: free Avira = nagware = no thanks
Is either Linux or FreeBSD
no matter how good it is, it is human nature always wants to make things better
After using AVG Free for many years I switched to Microsoft Security Essentials and haven't looked back. Tiny footprint and up to date definitions make this not only the best free A/V available but one of the best all around A/V programs out there.
You may want to get a version of linux made after 2000.
I've been using Comodo Anti-virus (http://antivirus.comodo.com/) for a while now. Started with their firewall a while ago and then they bundled the AV. Good timing because AVG was bloating out at the time. I've had good experiences with this and most of my siblings now use it to and I pretty much get no support calls now. I don't use the Defence+ thing most of the time though.
That depends on what you mean by "browse the internet". I visit a very small list of sites, and rarely visit anywhere else. If I don't recognize domain name in a URL, I probably won't go to it.
But you're missing the point. I'm not claiming I'll never get a virus. I'm claiming I'll most likely never get a virus.
Even if I do somehow get a virus sometime in the next two years, to me it's not worth two years of resource hogging and slower file loads just to avoid the chance.
Yeah, I wouldn't let my sister touch my computer. The last computer I had to remove viruses from was hers... I've never seen a computer with so many viruses. Spent like five hours trying to remove them, but finally gave up and reformatted, saving what documents I could.
With a good firewall in the middle and no other computers on your network that are compromised, you can run without AV quiet safely..
Now I have a roommate that I would NOT recommend abandoning AV.... but even with him doing his downloading I very, very rarely run into virus issues (4 years clean now, actually)...
I've come to the conclusion that with proper preventative steps to lower your risk (i.e. not using IE, etc.), Flash/Adobe plugins disabled in Firefox unless I need them... Your risk of getting a virus is a LOT lower.
1) Download and visit only safe/trusted sites
2) Don't use Internet Explorer
3) Disable plugins for IE anyway, and disable firefox plugins unless needed
4) Don't use Outlook for e-mail
5) Always be behind a firewall, regardless of what the idiot from your ISP tells you to do to
6) A few other tips but are mostly common sense >.>
I've been using Vipre Antivirus since I started working as a computer tech. 90+% of the machines I see every day are highly infected and that so far has caught and cleaned all but one type of infection - Alureon/TDSS.y (which it will stop and remove just fine). Microsoft Security essentials gets that one (and cleans it out correctly, leaving a system capable of booting afterwards). Microsoft Security Essentials otherwise is about 80% as effective... again, sufficient unless you're in a "toxic" environment as I am.
All you need is an add from some trusted site and you are screwed. It could even be a banner on a major car manufacturers home page.
Basically, my advice to people who are relatively savvy is not to bother with antivirus. Once antivirus detects anything, it's generally too late. AV can be useful for people who have _no_ clue, but they're bound to get infected anyway sooner or later.
Wrong , if the AV software reacts it's normally because it's actually doing it's job and preventing infection. One or two times a year NOD32 informs me of an infected file and i let it delete it. At work i often get notifications from Trend Office Scan that a couple of files on some users computer have been infected,detected and deleted. So in my experience AV software is mandatory ..... even on my own machine, and i believe i know what i'm doing.
What i don't understand is the obsession with free ..... nothing is free, really. I don't mind paying an unsubstantial amount of money for beeing protected against loss of data , and more important for me , the hassle and time involved in a format and réinstall.
I use Adblock Plus :)
I only disable adblock on two sites right now, and that only because I feel they deserve the ad income.
I do work with network security (that is, I monitor clients traffic on a network, looking for suspicious traffic) and I can tell you that Bittorrent is not the way people get virus/malware today. Neither is it via the network (a worm), and seldom via e-mail.
It is by visiting a website, which contains malware via Flash, Iframes and/or Ads. A so-called drive-by. This usually happens either by someone linking to a "dangerous" website in Facebook, Twitter or a public forum and saying it's a funny video of some kind. Or a popular website has gotten an Ad from a 3rd party where the Ad contains some dangerous Flash-code.
As long as you do not run the latest version of Firefox/IE/Adobe Flash/Adobe Acrobat Reader and you are at the wrong site at the wrong time, you get infected! And sometimes the latest version of that software is exploitable too.
I've recently had to reinstall Windows at home as well. This time I'm trying out Windows 7's XP Mode. Since it hides the Desktop and integrates the app (in this case Firefox with NoScript) to Windows 7 other then a few seconds extra to start the app it seems to work decent enough. Reminds me a lot of Parallel's on my Mac.
Inside the VM I have the AV, Anti Spyware, and Firewall running. But when I shut down the browser the system isn't bogged down with such crap. Takes up more resources while the browser is up, but less when it's not.
Will see how it goes but I think it might be a nice way of getting the best of both worlds. Just a thought.
I installed the Ubuntu anti-virus and now everything looks different and my games and a bunch of Apps I use don't work!
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
I can tell you that Bittorrent is not the way people get virus/malware today.
I didn't mean that Bittorrent itself is a vector for virus propogation, only that back in my high school days when I pirated things via P2P networks, most every pirated game came laden with viruses. I suppose I simply assumed that pirated games obtained via P2P networks today would also have that problem.
Yeah, I can see drive-by infections being more of a problem. Of course, as one of the guys on my Steam friends list could tell you, it takes me a long time knowing you before I'll trust random links you send me.
My office mate runs no AV. When we first started sharing an office, and I discovered she used no protection, I was shocked and convinced her to let me install one. It found no viruses or malware, and so slowed her machine she demanded I remove it, which I did. She's a lawyer, older, and not at all tech saavy. Of course, she never looks at porn.
Come on mods, a +3 troll at least.
That is why I would recommend to TFA that he install Comodo as so far the detection rate has been excellent. It's free, doesn't suck up resources (currently using a whole 10Mb) has a MUCH better firewall than the one built into Windows, is easy for noobs to use, in short it "just works".
So if he wants something simple, easy, and free, with a really good detection rate and no bloat, I'd go with Comodo. I've even given it to my most clueless family members and so far nobody has had a bit of trouble understanding or using it. Comodo tries to make the alerts in plain English, doesn't pop up alerts unless there is something reasonable, very easy to manage. But you are right running without AV in this day and age is just stupid, especially when there are good AV programs like Comodo that doesn't cost a penny.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
best free antivirus alternative = linux.
just sayin'...
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Unfortunately, running as non ADMIN on windows XP creates problems. One example is when a software updates, it can stop to work. I've had the case with firefox. Firefox will update silently and on the next reboot, the software won't start, producing an error.
Also, it doesn't prevent malware from installing but only limits the how deep malware can infect the windows OS.
Men are born ignorant, not stupid; they are made stupid by education. Bertrand Russel
Avira rates consistently high on the AV-Comparatives.org site and even with high heuristics set, the overhead on the system is far lower than AVG or Avast. I use Iobit 360 with Advanced System Care to take care of threats other than virii, Peerblock and Windows Firewall behind a NAT router to keep things away and Malwarebytes Anti-Malware, a Kaspersky and Avira BootCD to clean anything if anything gets past the other layers. Just like when it gets cold outside, nothing protects better than layering.
I also run Windows 7 on my gaming machine and I think you get just as much protection using the freebies as a good host file or a black hole DNS. I think it's not a question of if you will get a virus surfing or downloading with Windows but when and how destructive. My personal vote is for ClamWin. The new version features an add in for Outlook, scheduled scans, and a high detection rate. It is however not proactive but you can always pair it with a program like Winpooch.
Chris Sheppard
(Yes, I know it's still technically possible to get a virus. But the chances are extremely slim, given the way I use my computer.)
Do you use FlashPlayer or Acrobat Reader, and if so do you run them as Admin? If so, you're not safe. There are numerous exploits for both, and Adobe is very slow about patching them. If your browser is configured to prompt you before downloading/displaying PDFs, then you at least have a chance to block those - I've had several completely legit sites attempt drive-by PDF downloads to my system, presumably containing malware (no other reason a webcomic or forum would try to send my a PDF upon loading the main page). For FlashPlayer, your only safe options are disable it or sandbox it. I went with sandboxing once I figured out how, and before that disabled it except for specific uses on specific sites.
Of course, if you run as Admin/root you're *still* asking to get hosed. That's just a terrible idea all around. Zero-day exploits happen, and the attacks can come from pretty much anywhere. Short of disconnecting entirely, the best you can hope for is that they do little to no damage (most malware expects full access and won't run if it doesn't have it).
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
Why do they make you download it?
it has more to do with not being sued by mcafee, norton, et al. than anything else. remember when microsoft tried to give you a browser for free? now they are being forced by law to implement a "browser chooser" that runs at OS install time.
MS is certainly not concerned about the quality of your computing experience unless it involves you not purchasing any more MS products.
surprise, but no company is concerned about you in any way at all other than whether you will buy and continue to buy more of their products.
I have to wonder what sort of nefarious sites you people are visiting that you get attacked by drive-by PDF downloads. I've not once had this happen to me.
Similarly, what nefarious sites are serving you malicious Flash? The only Flash-enabled sites I ever visit are Youtube and Hulu, and it's hard to believe *those* sites would let themselves get compromised. I have adblock blocking flash ads.
As for running as admin... have you ever tried running Windows XP as non-admin? I have to, on my work laptop, and it's so much of a pain that for a personal machine you're better off taking the risk running as admin.
Windows 7's got its little UAC thing, and I don't run Linux as root...
FlashPlayer, Acrobat Reader, RealPlayer, and Opera are all available for Linux. On my distro (openSuse) they're in the official "NON_OSS" repository, and will happily install and update automatically using the package manager.
Installing support for the Microsoft, Apple, and Real codecs, plus DVD decoding (without installing RealPlayer, which I hate) was also quite easy. These are in "community repositories" that the package manager suggests when you select "Add repository"; you don't even have to enter the URL or anything yourself.
I don't use console emulators personally, but I've noticed quite a variety of them in the repositories. NES, SNES, N64, several Atari, and others were all present.
As for games, there are a couple of good games available for Linux natively (Battle for Wesnoth and Heroes of Newerth come to mind, but there are many others). The majority of games will also run, often flawlessly and with similar performance, under Wine; I play WarCraft 3, StarCraft, Total Annihilation, EVE Online, Heroes of Might and Magic III, and more using this method. Don't get me wrong; there are games that won't work. However, they're actually rather rare these days.
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
linux (unbuntu 9.10) won't play a DVD out of the box. don't need to ramble on about why, it doesn't matter. that's the type of thing that absolutely must work out of the box for linux to be viable on the desktop.
also, linux doesn't run IE6, 7, or 8 under wine. the best (most supported) version, according to the wine app DB is IE7 with silver support,
http://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=4195
from that page, i think this sums it up: "What works: Nothing"
Using nothing you leave yourself open to infection from sites you use often but has been compromised and had unwanted 'additions'. Even very well known and trusted sites to fall victim to SQL injection or cross site scripting attacks...
Having no virus scanner is like sleeping with 3 different women every night and not using a condom... one of them is going to have all the nasties and you will end up all swollen and sore with a doctor poking your soft bits and muttering 'who's been a naughty boy then'...
[The Universe] has gone offline.
After seeing this thread, I installed Opera 10 on Ubuntu 9.10. Point, click, done. Posting with it now. Seems to work OK, but nowhere near as fast as Chrome.
I long ago standardized on cross-platform applications. After my most recent hardware upgrades (new Acer personal laptop, Macbook for work) I blew away Windows 7 and Snow Leopard and switched both to Ubuntu Karmic Koala. On my hardware, it all Just Works. Don't have to worry about viruses. Couldn't be happier.
> for friends/relatives who run Windows.....
> I can entrust to keep the 'my computer's doing weird things' calls to a minimum?"
I feel for you.
I am the only computer geek in my whole extended family and many of my friends. I refuse to support MS-Windows at all. Period. They all know I use Linux exclusively, and I can honestly say that I have no idea how to deal with or remove virii/malware. I will offer general advice about brands, equipment, peripherals, etc, but will not touch their machines nor walk them through anything. I will even give them the phone number of a nice, local shop that does computer work for reasonable prices (and I like the people and trust them; plus I like supporting the local economy and small shops that also offer Linux systems and support too).
But I also offer 100% support for any of them who want to run Linux. And four of them do, and I do everything I can to make sure their systems are setup properly, backed up regularly, work the best possible, answer questions, perform updates, etc.
No, it's not like that at all. It's like sleeping with the same woman every night while taking the chance that someone has come by and stuck her with a needle she wasn't aware of.
The chances of that happening are extremely slim.
So... the sites I use often. When was the last time Ars Technica or Slashdot was compromised with something spreading a virus? How about Penny-Arcade or xkcd?
I haven't said it isn't possible, I've only said I'm willing to risk the extremely small chance that I'll get a virus.
You're more likely to get infected via a driveby attack anyway. Plenty of well known sites are being hacked through SQL injections. Malware is then served to you through the attacked sites. Malware/Virus writers have the upper hand at the moment, but I see this changing in the coming months.
Also: It is well known that AV is an outdated and obsolete technology. Malware changes so often (once a day or faster in some cases) that AV companies can't keep up with their signatures. Malware is now written to evade detection from AV products. There is no one paid or free AV/anti-malware that will keep you safe. There is also no way to keep your windows box tuned to be completely secure. cyber criminals make big money off of 0-day IE, FF, Acrobat, and Flash vulnerabilities... so you can bet they are using them.
For now, you can use a mac :) but we will see how long that holds true. The more popular macs become. the more attacks will start showing up.
This is one product that gives me hope that we can someday fight off malware: http://www.fireeye.com/products/4xx0/index.html "FireEye security appliances detect modern malware using real-time, multi-protocol content analysis within virtual machines." (and no, I don't work for them;))
And yes, you are going to get a virus/malware, unless you disable all USB ports, ethernet ports, modems, cd rom drives, etc.
I just bought a new computer, and installed Windows 7 on it.
I have decided to forego antivirus software.
It seems to me that these things, like DRM, are circumvented nearly instantaneously. In fact, I have come to view computer security just like DRM - a futile endeavor.
I know not to run .exe files from emails, and I know not to download and install files I don't trust. I'm behind a hardware firewall.
I've run AVG for years, and never had a detection.
That's going to be the extent of my efforts.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
It wasn't just they were shipping a free browser with the OS. It was integrated with the OS. A bad idea even by today's standards. Why do it then? Embrace, extend, extinguish (or own) the internet. Sounds laughably evil? Sure it does.
Finally, someone actually takes the trouble to address the OP question. Thanks.
And yes, you are going to get a virus/malware, unless you disable all USB ports, ethernet ports, modems, cd rom drives, etc.
I think you're being far too pessimistic.
Tell you what. One year from today -- I've put it on my calendar -- I'll post on my blog the results of a virus scan and a malware scan. We'll see whether I can stay virus-free for a year.
More FUD - Microsoft were never in trouble for bundling a free browser. The slap on the wrist they received was for their anti-competitive business practices. At the time they claimed that the browser was an 'integral' part of the operating system!
Just because you can't be 100% safe with any given product is no reason to abandon it entirely.
I recently reinstalled Windows, and while I've historically used Avast, I opted to go with nothing this time around. I'm tired of resource usage and slower load times for everything thanks to antivirus; I've moved my e-mail to Google Apps, so they scan my e-mails for viruses. My use of Bittorrent is extremely limited (I only have it installed because Star Trek Online's installer is available via torrent), and I never visit the seedier side of the internet. I'm behind a firewall.
Basically I'm not going to get a virus, so I see no reason to run anti-virus software. Rather than "Can't be 100% safe, may as well not use it", my reasoning is "I'm already 99.99999% safe, so why bother".
(Yes, I know it's still technically possible to get a virus. But the chances are extremely slim, given the way I use my computer.)
Your not 99.9999% safe. You use windows, so you are not safe.
0day exploits. you have nothing protecting you against them. While you might feel safe using gmail, what about a bad ad that installs malware?
But really, what fucking bloat are you talking about? I use avg free and there ain't no bloat for the most part. Of course, i don't have it check links or any crap like that.
Maybe the bloat isn't your av, but your computer in general? If you don't defrag your disk, your computers going to slow down. Not to mention any of the other things thats slows a computer down.
Me, I use utorrent and download all sort of crap. games, apps, music, videos, porn. I don't get virus or malware. Why? besides the fact i'm not stupid, its because I check my stuff. I have an anti-virus installed, so I can check stuff with that. But I also browse internet using firefox, with adblocker and noscript running.
The best part is, I tend to have to clean peoples computers and laptops out of malware/viruses. And these aren't people who download crap and go to the "darker side" of the internet. But damn if they don't get thier computers fucked up all the time.
For all you know, you've already been rootkit'd and you don't know, and want to blame the slowness on your AV program.
Be seeing you...
I am surprise that no-one here has mentioned the excellent FortiClient software that is free of charge and includes not just AV, but also a firewall and IPSec and SSL VPN clients. I have found it to be very lightweight and uses little resources. http://www.fortinet.com/products/endpoint/forticlient.html
It's hard to argue for no antivirus at all, but at the same time there have been a large number of zero-day attacks such as the ones involving the flash vulnerabilities which antivirus did not detect. Sufficiently new malicious code which users are enticed to run has the ability to go unnoticed by up to date antivirus. While running no antivirus is probably a bad idea on principle, it's definitely becoming more marginalized as malware authors continue to develop a higher degree of sophistication in hiding themselves from it.
Best practice is probably to install some kind of antivirus, but treat the PC as if it has no antivirus and develop some Internet "street smarts" -- to put it succinctly.
You use windows, so you are not safe.
Using Linux or OSX doesn't magically make you safe, you know, and Windows 7 is fairly secure, as long as you're careful what you download and install.
0day exploits. you have nothing protecting you against them.
Eh... antivirus programs aren't going to help you there unless the payload of the exploit is a known virus...
While you might feel safe using gmail, what about a bad ad that installs malware?
Adblock. Firefox is configured to not let things install without permission. Don't run flash on unknown sites. Etc etc etc.
What I'm describing is "safe internet browsing". It's not that hard a concept, and the fact that you seem to think drive-by malware installs via ads are inevitable merely proves that you don't know how to browse safely.
Don't take that to mean I think I'm immune to drive-by malware, only that I don't think they're inevitable.
For all you know, you've already been rootkit'd and you don't know, and want to blame the slowness on your AV program.
How exactly would one go about verifying that?
No wait, it's easy to verify. Compare video game load times with antivirus enabled to the same game's load times with antivirus disabled. You'll see exactly what I'm talking about.
You also get an additional slowdown when you first log in while the antivirus program loads itself, scans things already resident in memory, and so on. My work laptop has this problem - it is literally unusable for five minutes after I log in, because McAfee is so much of a resource hog. (If I stupidly start up Outlook while McAfee is still doing its startup routine, I get to wait a whole twenty minutes.) Granted, Avast isn't nearly that bad, but it's still a noticeable slowdown during the first minute or so of use after I log in.
Anyway, you, like so many others, have completely missed my point. I haven't said I can't get a virus. I've merely said that the chances of actually getting a virus are extremely slim. To me, it's not worth two years of resource hogging and slower load times to defend against the extremely slim chance that I'll get a virus.
Given that my computer usage habits have not changed in the last three years, and given that not once have I ever seen a virus warning pop up during those three years, I am led to the conclusion that my usage habits do not result in virus infections. Why then should I bother running antivirus?
SuperUser has basically the same question (http://superuser.com/questions/2/free-antivirus-solutions-for-windows/), as well as a discussion of the costs of choosing free over paid.
Solve all your woes in one foul swoop.
My Windows machine is seldom used and doesn't have anything on it that I care about.
Next question?
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
ubuntu
Nuff sed
genau.
i pulled the eth on my gaming machine when my girlfriend got me a lenovo s10e netbook.
ubuntu. end of story.
i know i can still get xssed and browser fucked, but hey, what you gonna do ? these things happen.
Radialpoint actually provides a really good security suite (Anti-Virus, Anti-Spyware, Parental Control + loads of other features) for free through its "user community" program: http://radialpoint.net/home/
This is the same security software that ISPs like Verizon, Rogers, Bell Canada, Virgin, etc... charge their customers anywhere from 8$-12$ a month to use.They give away a limited number of copies for free in order to collect crash data and improve the product that's ultimately delivered to ISPs, kind of like a perpetual beta test. The software itself is powered by the latest BitDefender engine for real-time, on-demand and scheduled scanning. It also lets you use WebSense to do parental controls.
They even have a Mac version that's freely available through their site. Check it out!
From the movie "The Treasure of Silicon Valley", Bill Gates in a bandito hat indignantly replies to Humphrey "Don't" Bogart:
"Antivirus? We ain't got no Antivirus. We don't need no Antivirus! I don't have to show you any stinkin' Antivirus!"
Often misquoted from "Blazing Windows" as
"We don't need no stinkin' Antivirus!"
Between my job, some side work and friends and family I manage close to 70 Windows machines. I have been doing IT since 1992.
Congrats, welcome to being a Junior Systems Administator.
When I am asked this question my answer is always this. None. I think antivirus is more trouble than it is worth. First any new viruses will be undetected, second the pain of actually running anti virus outweighs any marginal benefit received from it.
The crimeware industry is collectively thanking you for spreading your fantastic and totally bogus advice. Running a Windows box sans AV might be fine for you because you're so smart and have never found a rootkit on your machine, but I suspect your motivation for telling your less aware friends to use no AV whatsoever on a Windows machine is so you can generate some more side work. News Flash: Running a non-admin account will not even slow down some of the major botnet penetration rates - Depending upon what other apps you have loaded on your machine, Zeus can pwn non-admin run machines too, smart guy - Google "privilege escalation". At least with some freebie AV, you might be able to catch the variant that came out yesterday, but probably not the one that came out an hour ago...better then nothing at all which is what your advice amounts to...but telling them to run something that's even free, or simply educating them about defensive internet use is too much trouble for you, in your mind. A screen door and a clue is better then no damned door and at all.
Your security insights to the those who don't know any better then to listen to you is dangerous, and your suspect motivation is even worse. You'd be better off with the standard "Install Linux and you don't need AV" or "Get a Mac" spiel or better yet, take your advice back to 1993-1994 (and you were in IT then, so you say) when it was last actually correct.....that's about the last time Windows was safe from *requiring* some sort of AV. You've probably never seen what happens to someone who's great at what they do in the outside world (IE rather intelligent), and has a semi-clue with computers, have to put their lives back together after their identity was sold for a pittance (the going rate for a stolen identity is around $15.00 USD) after opening a well engineered landmine of a mail. All that horseshit you see about LifeLock and whatnot....Doesn't do jack squat after you've had your life pwnd. It's pretty sad that one little click on an email with a zipped EXE masked as a PDF attachment that was on a up to date XP machine with Automatic Updates on with an exipred licensed AV client and an older version of Acrobat Reader installed run with non-admin rights can have such ugly consequences....an up to date freebie AV client would probably have caught this little piece of trash....or have you told friends that Acrobat 7.0 Reader isn't really all that safe? I was told about it afterwards "when I clicked on the PDF it didn't do anything or launch Acrobat so I didn't think anything of it", she not knowing it had done its silent install and began mining away on her machine and was happy to report back her banking details to the C&C server. Her understanding of a virus was it would immediately alert her that she caught something like spring porn pop-ups all over the place (this isn't 2004 anymore) or change her background and tell her she was infected (she must have caught SpyFalcon or one of those fake AV types of rogue scareware once before) - do you educate your friends and users that these new viruses do whatever they can to not announce their presence, or is that also too much trouble for you? You were the hero with your free online tool and caught the one that did, congrats...here's your cookie. Did you get all of it.......?
We live in a crime filled world, where some smart folks want to do as little as possible to make the fat bank and don't give a shit who's lives they ruin. Your identity sells for next-to-nothing on the underground n
I currently use Commodo Internet Suite (Free Version) and ThreatFire (Anti-Malware) concurrently. And since I tend to be very paranoid, I will update and run malwarebytes on full scan mode maybe every two weeks. I started with AVG 0.9 way back when and still recommend the free edition to anyone who asks me for a good "free" anti-virus suite, I also recommend running an additional resident anti-malware program concurrently.
I don't see why it's so hard to use the situation as a point of marketing for GNU/linux, or to show the person(s)/relative(s) that overall costs of using/maintaining a Microsoft Windows based workstation (or server) far outweigh the other options. Ok, a Mac costs a bit, but how much is spent on maintenance? Ok, the public is freaky about using GNU/linux, ,but what about total software costs and maintenance?
My mother and father living in Texas (rather far-off for me to support them from Sydney) finally *DID* bite the bait, and bought a Mac. Happy? Very. Many of my personal clients have either taken the step to move to GNU/linux, or have purchased Macs. With the odd exception here and there, they're all happy. The exceptions are mostly along the lines of "Well, I'm supposed to run *THIS* because of work..." - or "My workplaces doesn't support GNU/linux or Mac" (Even though it's just a matter of running Microsoft Office and nothing more).
Remember that you get what you pay for.
I would, however, stick with doling out AVG for folks - and that being the case, stay on top of having the latest installation EXE for it - along with AdAware by Lavasoft and Spybot Search & Destroy. There is also ClamAV (developed initially for UNIX/GNU/Linux) for MS Windows - and it's F.O.S.S. - but hey, in the end it's your choice.
YankDownUnder Veni, Vidi, volo in domum redire
Yeah. That too. Perhaps I was being too kind.
You'd think that a company that has been in the OS business since the dawn of the PC would have figured out how to write a good one by now.
A multi-billion dollar company that can afford to hire the best minds in computer science, and their flagship desktop OS product is just barely able to compete with a free OS written by a bunch of longhaired granola heads.
(I'll take the free OS)
As long as you do not run the latest version of Firefox/IE/Adobe Flash/Adobe Acrobat Reader and you are at the wrong site at the wrong time, you get infected! And sometimes the latest version of that software is exploitable too.
I don't use Acrobat, I use one of the free alternatives. I use a proxy filter that screens all ad sites, scripts, and media players (even GIF animation) on all sites by default, unless I put them into a whitelist. I also use Process Guard to let me know when things are trying to run on my computer, and I don't even allow many "legit" things to run. I DON'T update things very often, and don't auto-update ANYTHING. Updates are only done for a few MS OS critical patches, which I hand pick and install individually after reading the security bulletins. I don't use IE or Firefox, but an old version of another browser, but it hardly matters because all of this constitutes a locked-down sandbox where a virus can't get near the browser.
I DON'T use antivirus. I also don't use a FIREWALL on my computer, though I do use one on my router. I've been doing this on several Windows systems (all XP) and they all run like a bat out of hell, since virtually all of the resource hogging stuff is disabled. I've been doing it like this for at least 5 years, and have never even seen a virus attempt, much less gotten infected. I have seen a lot of crap from Adobe try to muscle into my system, which is why I finally uninstalled Acrobat in favor of an alternative.
Antivirus software is like closing the barn doors after the horses have bolted. By the time the virus is in the database, it's old news and something new that hasn't made it into the database yet is the current threat. The whole concept of antivirus is fatally flawed, and there is a serious conflict of interest in the AV companies to actually produce something that works outside of a subscription (oh no, you need our latest AV defs!) model. If they sold that, they wouldn't be able to keep dinging you for regular updates. It's a scam that I think is at least as bad as the virus programs themselves, I doubt that a bot running on my system would make it perform any WORSE than running AV software on it does. I've been there, done that, and it turns my entire system into complete crippleware for no good reason.
there's a MS-sponsored paper that states that users are RATIONAL to reject all security advise like running updated antivirus. see: http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/security/?p=3275&tag=nl.e036 which has a link to the .pdf of the paper
cjacobs001
Yes, I realize that 7 9s was an exaggeration. It was meant to be.
I've often considered NoScript, but then, I've never had a Javascript-based exploit infect me (or if it has, Avast hasn't detected it, so antivirus wouldn't help anyway). Basically I have no motivation to install it.
No antivirus on the net, is like having lots of casual sex without a condom and claiming your "SAFE" because you only choose the clean ones.
Condoms are not 100% effective as well, but it is still a good idea to use them.
EA David Gardner -"... but the consumers have proven that actually what they want is fun."
It has to do with computers. Don't fret your little mind over it.
I have comcast, which gave me McAfee for the last few years, but then they switched to Norton, which caused nothing but problems for my machine. So, I went on the same search about a week ago. I tried quite a few, but after reading about many, I settled on MSE as well.
Clamwin had issues in that all the testing reviews I could find only showed it recognizing about 50% of the viruses that were thrown at it. Avast! was listed higher, but it slowed machines down, AVG has always had one issue or another on the computers I've installed it on, and the free versions of any commercial product are so watered down that they were not worth it, either.
I went with MSE after reading quite a few positive reviews that put it above most other free AVs out there. It's got it's own issues (only finding about 95% of the viruses thrown at it), but it's still much better than any other option I've tried. I've even found it to not interfere with any other processes that are running.
One virus
Two viru's
Take off every 'sig' !!
If you're going to try XP mode, get a copy of Windows XP and install it in a VM. VMWare Player is free, probably more secure, easier to deal with, and doesn't require the VT enabled processor technology that XP Mode requires. While you're at it wipe the machine first, install Linux as your primary OS and install Windows 7 as a virtual machine too. Almost everybody has a few legacy XP licenses lying around. If you're going to use virtualization to sandbox Windows you might as well be thorough and sandbox W7 as well. As a bonus, look into LTSP, and you'll find you can do quite capable VDI (Virtual Desktop Infrastructure) quite capably with Linux with a little tweaking.
Most Linuxes come with virtualization tech standard, but VMWare player works on Linux too, and there are a number of different brands you can use.
This Spring this is going to ruin your gaming experience if you're into that. Over the next year VM technologies will adopt PCI passthrough, and that problem will hit the dustbin of history.
Linux people are so spoiled. I have to have a private cloud server architecture in my house (DRBL) with redundant networks both wired and wireless and virtualized everything because my family demands a five nines SLA and my teens think it's perfectly normal to play their games via RDP on their iPod touches.
I'm going to get a few replies here. Does anybody know of an RDP client for the Nintendo DSi?
Help stamp out iliturcy.
You're most welcome. And if you or TFA want total protection and control I would highly recommend combining Comodo AV/Firewall with another lesser known of their free products Comodo Time Machine which is kinda hard to describe, best description would be system restore on steroids.
It makes a snapshot on first install, makes it easy to schedule snapshots, unlike System Restore it allows you to mark certain snapshots never to be erased (like when you install an app you aren't quite sure of) and according to Comodo you can even use it to roll back before malware got on board, but since Comodo AV has caught everything I haven't had a chance to see that particular feature in action. What I have used it for is those that are the type to bork their machines, as the built in GUI console allows for even a noob to restore windows after a failed boot up, very handy.
The only warning I have about it is DO NOT use if you are dual booting with Windows 7, as Windows 7 changes drive letters (for example my win 7 is installed on E: but shows C: when in win 7) which can throw it off, but it won't cause any damage, it simply fails to install. But for those that only have one OS it is a simple way to have insurance against boot failure due to bad software. It also uses few resources and can be used with system restore if you desire, but it works so much better I usually just kill System Restore to reclaim the space.
But with the two of those together, Comodo AV/Firewall plus Comodo Time Machine, you have an easy to use Windows install that is pretty damned hard to permanently bork. Comodo AV protects against the bugs, Comodo Time Machine protects from bad installs and most basic PEBKAC problems. And of course both are free, so you really have nothing to use by trying them. Note-Not affiliated with Comodo, just a happy user that is glad he doesn't have to spend so much time fixing relative's machines any more.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
I like AVG and have sold it to most of my clients, but it is getting to the same level of bloatware as Norton and Mcafee that it is starting to not be competitive. The problem fer me is that now a days classic viruses are no longer the problem in fact I no longer find any value in an antivirus product for my personal use, Windows 7 and UAC have been great in controlling threads, and my laptop runs great without any antivirus software. I still don't get why all the antivirus software with all the bloat they bring can't properly fight malware which is really what is affecting our computers today. They seem to just want to collect subscription fees to fight threats that no longer exist. At the end what may fix all the problems is requiring digital signatures for all software available, and only allow white listed products to be installed. Obviously Microsoft will be attacked for doing this.
Well, I followed my old (your current) philosophy for about 15 years, so I certainly can't refute you might not get malware for a while. ;-) However, realizing the abundance of information on my computer, I now feel it is worth it for me to have the virus scanner hogging my resources. :( Not to mention the peace of mind in knowing there isn't a detectable keylogger in the background grabbing my banking passwords. To each his own, though. Different situations have different risks.
The ad engines that commercial sites use sell ads to whoever pays. Flash is one of the top three malware vectors. Do the math.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
So... turn on adblock, and disable flash. The math seems fairly simple, to me.
That's great guidance. At least it saves time.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
The chances are extremely slim if you only consider the infection vectors that you know about. I ran my system without AV very successfully for a good while, but over time new vectors cropped up that I was unprotected against. I thought to myself, "This has worked well for a long time," but stupidly equated that with, "This will continue to work well." In fact, the correct conclusion should have been, "It probably can't last much longer."
Security researcher Rafal Los tells this story, which appeared on Slashdot not long ago. Since you won't visit unknown sites, I'll excerpt the key points:
"They volunteered a URL and I started by opening up the page... I tried a few permutations of the common SQL Injection attack [and found that] I wasn't the first to hack at it... someone had not only pillaged their database and broken it - but had also injected it to distribute malware. Malware you say? Yessir... analysis revealed it was a dropper script for the Zeus-bot. So... in 45 minutes the room had gone from non-believers to realizing they not only had a massive SQL Injection problem - but had also been rooted and were now distributing the Zeus bot from one of their main websites."
The author includes some slightly-anonymized screenshots that indicate this is no "seedy" website but the professionally-developed SQL-backed main page of a large restaurant chain. I see no reason to think that Ars or xkcd would be any less vulnerable.
Avoiding the unsafe is easy if the safe stays safe, but it doesn't. Fifteen years ago, users would consult me in a panic upon receiving prank warnings of destructive email viruses. I assured them that email viruses are impossible, because email is not executable. And this was, for a time, true.
Freedom is not the license to do what we like, it is the power to do what we ought.
I look after a number of networks and find that Comodo offers one of the best solutions, both free and non-free.
I agree that common sense helps to aviod several viruses.
But 'Linux dont have viruses because it's not as popular as Windows' is a myth.
Example, Apache is far more popular then Microsoft IIS, yet Apache has near-zero viruses.
Also fun is that running Windows-programs in Wine is much safer then running them
in Windows.
Linux security model has fundamental differences from all Windows versions.
Windows simply wasnt made from the ground-up with proper security in mind. And now
Windows has grown in size that a re-write is impossible.
Even when/if Linux becomes 100% popular and all the worlds criminals etc tries
to create malware for Linux, they wont succeed in building one that spreads. Each
machine must be infected one by one, manually by each user. These users must be
dumb enough to manually infect themselfs *while* smart enough to know how to do so.
Any automatic spread will be extremly rare and extremly short-lived, if it ever
happens at all.
There will never be a need for running anti-malware to protect Linux.
There's some material on the subject, here's a good one,
http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/faq/index.php?page=virus#virus
Here's a challange to try to write a Linux virus,
http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/skoll/anti-virus.php
No offense to you or your lady, but you should teach her safer browsing habits.
Blame the user. That's nice. Maybe you guys could just deliver this "Trusted Computing" platform Bill discovered in 2002.
FYI, if you don't use Windows you can click on the Internet with reckless abandon. We call it "browsing". It doesn't require reading every URL before you click it, worrying about whether your computer will become useless with each click. You should try it - it's fun. Since you're a Windows user, let me recommend to you the quite capable Knoppix.
This "safe browsing" you recommend is neither safe nor browsing. Hand-translating each URL beforehand, researching the domain name and ASN of the host IP, avoiding links to video, PDF documents or unusual image or audio formats before clicking the link isn't the process that was being described when Tim Berners-Lee invented the web client "WorldWideWeb" on NeXT. Even taking all that trouble isn't safe. Even a perfectly normal and accepted top-100 site can carry flash banner ads sold to the advertising syndicate by affiliates who sold those ads of unknown provenance to anonymous strangers. Since flash itself is a top-3 vector, and the link could go to literally anything, it's entirely possible to hose a windows box with a plain flash ad. And then there are the popovers, unders, and whatnot. To a Windows user who's read Microsoft guidance, browsing the Internet must seem like hugging a porcupine.
Mac users and Linux users don't have that problem, mostly because they don't take their Infosec guidance from a company so obviously ignorant of the topic.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
The ads pay for the sites. If you block the ads, you're stealing content. Didn't you get the memo? Have you no respect for intellectual property? This may even be a DMCA violation - are you giving legal advice?
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Hi, I used to work Microsoft tech support and we've seen this issue before. You'll need to reinstall Windows, just like you would have to do if you had any of the other 50000 problems in my script. In fact, that's why I don't work there any more. They replaced us all with a voicemail greeting that says "Reinstall Windows" in a totally sultry sexy female voice. It's so AI, it waits for you to stop talking before it plays the message. That's an amazing innovation, and technology that only Microsoft and Dell have (I guess they cross-license it).
Help stamp out iliturcy.
AVG sucks a lot.
It updates using the C drive, regardless of your profile folder or temp folder settings. I had a 3GB XP installation, with program files on the D: partition. XP SP3 and related files filled up the drive - now AVG can't update. Many complaints on the user forums and the reply is basically eat a bowl of something unpleasant.
Little windows popping up all the time - advertisements, the scan started, scan stopped. It's pretty annoying. Many people have no problem, but if I see something move, even out of the corner of my eye, it gets my attention.
I might have figured this one out, but often you can't stop a scan. A scan you didn't start. I have no scheduled scans, and did not start a shell extension scan. Open it to troubleshoot the above update problems, and it's scanning. What's it scanning? Currently scanning: [blank]. 0 files. Scanning. Stop and pause buttons are clickable, but the animation keeps going and it's scanning whatever. This is in the user forums since version 8, then 8.5 and I saw it in 9. Still not fixed, but they managed to add lots of annoying popup windows and notifications.
AVG used to be the only thing I would recommend, but since about version 8, and the transition from Grisoft to AVG Industries or whatever, it's impossible. My gf saw me fighting with it and refuses to even consider installing it.
I'm sure he's trying, it just hasn't finished downloading yet.
I can back this up -- I have been using Comodo for over a year after switching from AVG, and have had great success. I've switched my family over as well, and the virus complaints have gone way down. On top of that, I've started recommending Comodo for clients of mine, and they have been thrilled with the result. The smaller memory footprint alone makes it an easy sell over AVG. Aside from one nasty upgrade bug last October, it's been a huge improvement. Let me put it this way -- it made me stop thinking about anti-virus software. Isn't that the whole point?
Check out Microsoft Security Essentials If is free, if you have a licensed copy of XP , or Vista or W7. I find W7 with Office 2007 as tempting for the desktop as using linux. And with free AV, there is something to learn from it's different architecture.
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
I know you're going to be a jerk and insist on proof of seven years. Here's a nice link from seven years ago. Oh, my. There was Google seven years ago, and the Internet Archive too. You're hosed. Your entire argument is based on the premise that people forget. People do forget, but Google doesn't.
Will Bing forget? I think so. That's why when I want to know someting I google it.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Since you won't visit unknown sites
You don't have to be condescending. hp.com is hardly an "unknown site".
I realize that new attack vectors pop up from time to time. I'm willing to take the risk.
If it's a site I respect, I disable adblock. Sites I respect tend to have respectable ads, as well.
For example, Penny-Arcade approves every ad that shows up on their site. They're not going to approve an ad that distributes malware, and I like Penny-Arcade, so I disable adblock on Penny-Arcade. I do this on a case-by-case basis. You may not agree with doing it that way, but that's not my problem ;)
This is only relevant for pay-per-impression ads. If you never click pay-per-click ads anyway, then blocking them has no effect.
Have you no respect for intellectual property? This may even be a DMCA violation - are you giving legal advice?
Those are three completely unrelated topics, and they're unrelated to ads as well. Blocking ads has nothing to do with IP, nor with the DMCA, nor with legal advice. I'm left assuming you're trolling :P
Condescension not intended. It wasn't clear to me whether your whitelist was strict or not, so I figured it wouldn't hurt to include the excerpt. Apologies if the wording was poor.
Freedom is not the license to do what we like, it is the power to do what we ought.
My laptop has vista on it.
I don't connect it to the tubes at all.
It still does weird shit all the time.
Does this mean vista is one large steaming pile of malware?
"Suppose you were an idiot...and suppose you were a member of Congress...but I repeat myself." Mark Twain
Interestingly, if you simply go to comodo.com you are introduced to only their non-free version of the antivirus, which costs $49 per annum. It is a bit tricky to find your way around the website to find the free version, which does exist.
I actually use Avast!, and am quite happy with it. I think I will not change anyway soon. And I like the voice messages on updates from Avast!
A very safe way to browse is to do the browsing from inside a virtual machine. A good option is to copy the virtual machine hard disk image each time you start, so next time you start from a clean machine.
This ensures that your computer will not be infected, and that you can run an antivirus in it but not bother with it very much (AVG, for example, is the one I run). You could even risk running your machine without an antivirus.
How is this considered troll or off-topic? There is some serious pro-MS modding on this article, which is weird. Maybe I'm not on Slashdot? Better check the date... um, not April yet.
I use Nod32 on my corporate network and at home, and can highly recommend it, but this doesn't fit the 'free' specification. AV comparatives is a great independent site where they do regular testing (several times a year) including both free and paid AV software: http://www.av-comparatives.org/
Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there. - Will Rogers
This post is double encrypted, so the penalty for decrypting it should be increased as well.
coffee | nose > keyboard
As a professional cheapskate I have been using free antivirus programs for years, here are my recent experiences. tl;dr version: Avast or MS Security Essentials are the best choices on a Windows machine.
Avast
Virus Detection: Medium to good
Resource Use: Medium
This is my antivirus of choice, they have recently updated the interface at long last. A friend had a bunch of malicious software only a few months back. I ran multiple antivirus and antimalware programs until nothing was found. Then I installed Avast as his antivirus was way out of date. Avast's email scanner was going crazy and I realised the computer was sending out spam. I would never have noticed if it was not for the email scanner.
Avira AntiVir
Virus Detection: Don't know
Resource Use: Medium to light
Seems OK though it does harass you with a window to buy their products.
AVG
Virus Detection: Don't know
Resource Use: Medium
Last year I had problems on two different machines. For some reason the AVG browser plugins were blocking access to the Internet. This took me ages to track down the problem. On another machine a few months before that it started causing all sorts of problems and crashing. I will avoid it for now but it seems to be only me who has had these problems.
MS Security Essentials
Virus Detection: Good
Resource Use: Light
MS Security Essentials is very similar to Windows Defender and uses the same framework and engine which probably accounts for its small footprint. A great leave and forget solution, I tend to install this on friends machines.
Symentec Endpoint Protection
Virus Detection: Good
Resource Use: Double decker bus size.
OK it's not a free program but this is what I have to put up with at work. I hate it! I hate it! From the 20Gb files it used to create to the recent problem where they screwed up their date settings. It increases boot time no end and the weekly scan cripples every computer in the company. Arrggghh!
The most dangerous drug
I need two things (actually I need many more than just two, but I am condensing that to just two regarding the lattice-lettuce mix-up).
A better spellchecker and a new mouse.
Those two bloody words are right next to each other and my mouse has shown affinity towards clicking all by itself lately.
I am guessing that it has something to do with all that DNA I've impressed into it during the years - it has finally become sentient and it is trying to communicate.
The other day it clicked on a spyware link all by itself. Took me three days to finally get rid of all of that shit.
But I've found a way to control its outbursts of "behaving".
I've plugged in another mouse. Of "El Cheapo" variety that you find in a box of biscuits these days.
Ergonomically it feels like you are holding an empty deodorant stick of Chinese manufacture - but it clicks where it is supposed to. When you press it hard enough.
The real advantage comes from having both mice plugged in at the same time (Wonders of USB. Couldn't do that back in the day.).
If I was really up to it, I guess I could use one for the clicking and the other for moving the cursor around. Loads of fun that is.
You can keep yourself entertained for... umm... seconds at a time.
But that is secondary. (HA!) See, now that it is sentient, my old mouse is realizing that I can still easily replace it (him, her, them... whatever) with its dumb cousin.
So, it is acting nicer now. It will only double-click on some porn from time to time - just for laughs.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
is there another product I can entrust to keep the 'my computer's doing weird things' calls to a minimum?
Linux?
More to the point, what I do is absurdly enough a bit simpler: Run linux at the actual HW, install something like VMware or VirtualBox, install Windows and other essential SW in a virtual machine, configure, and then immediately make a snapshot. Whenever the Windows systems screws up because of malware, restore the snapshot. Keep essential data on a filesystem shared from the linux system or something similar.
Don't know if anyone has mentioned this one yet, but I've installed their products on my netbook,
to no ill effect so far. They have 3 free products: Anti-virus, Firewall and Threatfire antimalware.
Website is http://www.pctools.com/
Don't blame me, it's usually 2 in the morning when I post
The best thing is to drop all this and let your system's natural immunity develop. Overprescription of AV software just encourages the growth of AV resistant viruses. Basic hygiene is still important, so wash your computer and all peripherals daily with warm soapy water. That will eliminate 99.9% of all viruses. Also data.
I use blink which is a home version of the Retina scanner by eEye. It has a virus and firewall and other stuff.
"I never visit the seedier side of the internet. I'm behind a firewall."
That's OK, he seedier side of the internet will visit you via cross-site scripting attacks and ad networks running malicious ads on reputable sites.
0 1 - just my two bits
There are millions of Linux and OSX computers.
And there are hundreds of millions of Windows computers.
And any malware author looking at these figures will realize that he can either spend N man-hours working on OS X or Linux malware, and infect K machines; or he can spend the same N man-hours working on Windows malware, and infect K*100 machines. Why would he ever choose to do the former and not the latter?
Absolute numbers don't matter. What matters in the proportion.
The difference is that UNIX based OSes have cleaned their act and are not as cavalier with security as you know who is.
You're welcome to list specific design problems in Windows that you believe result in worse security compared to Unix systems, so that we can discuss those in particular.
Antivirus 2009 is the best!!!! Just kidding. :-) Security Essentials (home) or Client Forefront (business) highly recommended.
Basically I'm not going to get a virus, so I see no reason to run anti-virus software. Rather than "Can't be 100% safe, may as well not use it", my reasoning is "I'm already 99.99999% safe, so why bother".
(Yes, I know it's still technically possible to get a virus. But the chances are extremely slim, given the way I use my computer.)
This was basically my thinking. I used antivirus for years and never ran into viruses. (I once had a file that was obviously a virus and, in a fit of sleepiness, hit enter instead of delete on the file, infecting myself. The installed Norton Antivirus did nothing and was quickly disabled by the virus.) Without antivirus my computer is more responsive and I'm at essentially the same chance of infection as I was before. If I run across a file that is suspect, there are numerous websites that allow files to be uploaded for scanning.
That being said, I recently installed Microsoft Security Essentials on my inlaw's PC and was impressed by how little overhead it seemed to have. I may install it on my PC on the off chance that someone else using my system downloads something that escalates privileges.
I use a series of Firefox Add-ons to reduce my risk. QuickJava lets me leave the Java and Silverlight plugins disabled by default. If I encounter a site where I need one, I'll enable them temporarily for that site, but it's pretty rare. Flashblock replaces all Flash objects with a play button, which lets me selectively enable applets. (Flashblock can be altered to do the same for Quicktime and other plugins, so I have taken advantage of this). PDF Download asks me to download PDF files instead of automatically running Adobe Reader. Adblock takes care the the miscellaneous bits.
If you really wanted to, you could browse with NoScript and be perfectly safe, but I've found that to be a pain.
For me, not even plugins are a good attack vector.
Unless you are only ever reading one site (slashdot, never reading TFA?) then you are already sleeping with multiple women...
and can you be sure that they are being faithful?
OK... maybe taking the analogy too far ;)
[The Universe] has gone offline.
As usual, this is a problem that can be solved with open source. See ClamWin.
Furries make the internet go.
And Malwarebytes free for that extra on-demand scan when something acts a little funny and you want to make sure.
We are the 198 proof..
I always recommend using a dedicated anti-spyware scanner alongside a dedicated anti-virus scanner.
Malwarebytes is decent, but it isn't 100% free. It is a free trial. It does harass you upgrade.
I recommend Spybot Search and Destroy because it is 100%, and the Immunize feature helps protect you from getting infections in the first place.
The stack I recommend for most users is:
Firefox + Adblock Plus (+ Noscript if you know what you're doing, but it doesn't pass the Grandma test)
HOSTS file
Spybot Search and Destroy
MSE
I don't run the Spybot real time protection, so the above stack uses very little in the way of resources yet provides very good security.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
There are 2 main alternatives. Alas, only one is free:
1) The free one is called "Ubuntu".
2) The other one is very shiny, and very expensive, but the good news is it comes with a free computer. Its name is "Snow Leopard".
Were you using IE?
(I find this highly relevant)
Two weeks ago installed windows xp-pro on a laptop with all security updates etc. Java (the latest), Foxit (the latest), IE8 etc. to keep it short. I setup a user account, added it to a domain, set the user as "Power user" (no admin rights). Pufff, done in less than two weeks. Pop-ups slow as sin. Words of advice, install an AV it might not work well and give you a false sense of security, but might last a bit longer between re-preps. I never tried the Microsoft AV, but from what I read. it's free.
"History is the realm of the true lie." A.Szerb
Nice... Keep thinking that you're safe, and I won't tell you how I would have gotten a virus just today when I downloaded a basic app for my HP calculator, were it not for my AV software, which detected it just when I downloaded the installer from HP's official site.
I hope you never download anything from anywhere, including sites which should be safe and trustful, but just aren't.
Just to let you know, I thought I'd actually have a look to see if any antivirus detected anything on my disk, so I downloaded and ran MSE. It picked up a trojan in an ancient zip that I never ran because I knew it was suspicious, so fair play for that. Nothing else though, MSE detected zero apart from that one file, and nothing else suspicious. MSE then proceeded to completely hose my system. Booting into Vista produced a BSOD and immediately rebooted. I caught "bad disk" before it rebooted once. Repair did not work, system restore to before MSE was installed did.
So a quick trial of MSE actually caused me way more problems than any virus ever has. A cost/benefit analysis would produce patently obvious results. I'll stick with my way.
I can see why you don't like linux, if you claim flash, opera 10 and realplayer don't run on linux. They work fine for me and millions of other people.
It seems to detect stuff that AVG never detected, it's free and it doesn't require you to do shit, except download and install ... try it , let us know :)
beware he who denies you access to information for in his mind, he already deems himself to be your master (SMAC-ish)
Believe it or not, I use Microsoft Security Essentials - I figured since most antiviruses are useless at detecting new threats anyways (bad guys can access the same antiviruses and make sure that they don't catch their new malware), I'm better off letting the guys who created my operating system, protect it. I've used Avast! and COMODO in the past and they were all good, but MSE has a very low footprint, updates well, and I'm pretty sure will be the first to protect against zero day vulnerabilities that Microsoft discovers... Next, I will try Panda Cloud AV.
Bow before me, for I am root.