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Which antivirus program do you prefer?
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18 years ago
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In my opinion, NOD32 (unlike Mr. Kaspersky's product) doesn't load the computer down much. At least, I haven't noticed it.
In reply to Hero In
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18 years ago
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Hero In;192600
Kaspersky is garbage (I can argue why), NOD32 is good, but it overloads the computer...
I use Symantec Antivirus, and once a month I run AVZ
+1, I use Symantec myself, and it hasn't let me down yet.
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18 years ago
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I have Dr.Web installed. It actually helps.
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17 years ago
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Greetings.

I offer for your review only the facts (it will be up to you to decide what is what and how it all fits together :) )

Comparison of various antiviruses based on a probabilistic assessment of their quality.

Currently, there is no shortage of information regarding antivirus testing. Moreover, the test results and the ratings assigned based on these results sometimes follow opposite vectors of evaluation.
As a rule, all tests boil down to evaluating the results of checking certain antiviruses against some set of malicious objects. The objectivity of such check results depends most heavily on the following aspects:
  • Availability of the virus collection or its composition to the antivirus authors
  • Quality of the virus collection
  • Adequacy of the virus set to real viral threats
- An antivirus whose authors know the composition of the virus collection in advance, or even better, have access to the collection itself, will always score 100 points. After all, the closer the contact between a particular antivirus and the testing experts, the better its "testing" result. Perhaps this explains such a wide variance in results across different tests?
- There are quite a few "collections" of viruses that include software modules that are only similar to viruses, but in reality are incapable of causing any harm. Most often these are programs that were infected by a virus, but subsequently the virus within them was sterilized—meaning the program was modified and the virus code no longer gains control. Such a program is no longer a malicious object, but it contains traces (signatures) of a virus's presence. If it is checked by an antivirus with primitive recognition algorithms—for example, by scanning the body of the checked object for certain signatures—then this "antivirus" will let out a victory cry, and its author will be proud that another antivirus "misses" the virus. A huge number of such examples can be given; therefore, if the quality of the collection is not verified and confirmed by independent specialists, the value of testing on such a collection will be low. Thus, primitive antiviruses will seem better than more advanced ones capable of modeling executable program code.
- Another important aspect is how adequate the chosen collection composition is to the existing threat. Again, there are a vast number of collections consisting of viruses for which the probability of landing on computers is zero. One has to deal with "testing" results using same-collector viruses held only by the antivirus author, who is very proud that this set of viruses is detected only by their antivirus and no one else! The real value of such an "antivirus" is also equal to zero.
In reality, the true value of an antivirus lies in its ability to prevent attacks from malicious objects that actually and currently threaten your computer. Unfortunately, all existing methods of testing antiviruses cannot provide such an assessment!
Below is a proposed methodology for assessing antivirus quality based on calculating the probability of an antivirus resisting attacks from malicious objects that actually threatened the computer system. The numerical value of such an assessment can be calculated using the formula:
Pav = (Nvir - Nbad) / Nvir
Where:
Pav - Probabilistic quality assessment of the antivirus; the closer it is to one, the better the antivirus.
Nvir - Total number of recorded malicious objects on this computer (organization).
Nbad - Number of malicious objects that the antivirus failed to detect at the time of attack.
Table 1 contains calculations of the reliability indicator (last column) for various antiviruses. The results of checking the reaction of various antiviruses to malicious objects actually encountered by the author of this publication between January 2006 and July 2007 were used as source data. The total number of recorded malicious objects was 51. The calculated reliability indicators for various antiviruses are provided in Table 1.
Table 1. Antivirus Reliability Indicators
Antivirus
Name
Viruses missed during the corresponding period of 2006 - 2007Viruses
missed out of
51 attacks
Antivirus
Quality
10.12 - 23.0217.0505.06 - 13.0712.0717.0721.0724-26.0727.0727.0730.0731.0703.08
DrWeb1210000300100170,667
Kaspersky1113100210011210,588
AntiVir1312021001011220,569
Fortinet1410022101111230,549
Sophos1910001001110240,529
BitDefender1413021011111250,510
McAfee1901022001101270,471
Ikarus191102110101027
eSafe1514112311000280,451
NOD32v21614021011111290,431
CAT-QuickHeal1903022011011300,412
ClamAV1603122211111310,392
VBA32180401121111131
Sunbelt2013022011011320,373
Norman211111130111032
F-Prot1614122311111330,353
Microsoft 261100100111133
Panda191402211101133
Authentium1614122311111340,333
AVG181402221111134
TheHacker2312111301111360,294
Ewido2214121311111380,255
Avast2504122011110390,235
Unfortunately, one of the antiviruses known in Russia, Symantec (better known here as Norton antivirus), did not fit into Table 1. This is because this antivirus was added to the VirusTotal website database on January 30, 2007, which made it impossible to include its indicators in the general table. However, thanks to the flexibility of the proposed assessment methodology, Symantec's reliability could be calculated using data from recent checks.
Table 2. Comparison of Symantec antivirus reliability indicator with other antiviruses.
Antivirus
Name
Viruses missed during the corresponding periodViruses
missed out of
17 attacks
Antivirus
Quality
30-0102-0202-0214-0223-0217-0717-0721-0721-07 24-0725-0725-0727-0727-0730-0731-0703-08
DrWeb0011000001110010060,647
Kaspersky0110100000111001180,529
NOD32v201100110100011111100,412
Symantec11110111111111100140,176

Sincerely K0Lb@zzeR.
In reply to K0Lb@zzeR
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17 years ago
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A comparison of various antivirus programs based on a probabilistic assessment of their quality.
Of course! Kaspersky is a master at finding viruses; it finds them everywhere, in Photoshop, Quip, images, Windows, game executables, and so on...
But in practice, the most recent antivirus in the table hasn't let me down. At least, not yet...
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17 years ago
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Is there any information about NOD32v3? After all, version 2 is a bit outdated.
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17 years ago
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A well-known antivirus expert, Andreas Marx, from the AV-Test.org laboratory, conducted tests of antivirus products for the upcoming year. Among the products relevant to Russian consumers, Norton Internet Security and Kaspersky Internet Security performed the best, while "Doctor Web" and VirusBuster Professional, which uses the antivirus engine of Outpost Pro from the St. Petersburg-based company Agnitum, were among the worst. Read also: The "Doctor Web" company announced the release of an updated version of the Dr.Web antivirus for Windows Mobile 4.44.1. As a reminder, Dr.Web for Windows Mobile was released in December 2007. The antivirus is characterized by its high reliability... Dr.Web for Windows Mobile updated to version 4.44.1 The Anti-Malware.ru portal summarized the results of the first test of antivirus products for performance and system resource consumption. The fastest antiviruses (Platinum Award) were Panda Antivirus 2008, Avira Antivir Premium 8.1.00.331, and Sophos... The fastest antiviruses have been identified The "Interсвязь" company, which provides Internet access services in the city of Chelyabinsk, has implemented the Dr.Web AV-Desk service. Starting September 15, all subscribers of the "Interсвязь" Group of Companies will be able to protect their computers with antivirus software... "Interсвязь" launches Dr.Web AV-Desk The test laboratory of Andreas Marx, AV-Test.org, summarized the results of an independent test of 33 antivirus products for "2009". In addition to the traditional subject of analysis – the level of detection of malicious software – the German testers studied the quality of proactive protection of new antiviruses, and also introduced an additional criterion – the frequency of updates of databases and program components. Among the leaders of the tests (from those vendors that are relevant to the Russian consumer) is the new generation of Norton Internet Security, which was slightly behind Kaspersky Internet Security 2009. On the laboratory computers, the tested antiviruses scanned a collection of 1.1 million fresh samples of malicious software that appeared in the "wild" in the last 3 months. In addition, 95,000 units of spyware were involved in the test. To check the quality of detection, 2.5 million "clean" files were used – components of the top 100 software, downloaded from the Internet. The tested antivirus products had to recognize them as safe. In addition to these tests, the scanners were also tested for the level of retrospective detection: about 65,000 viruses were offered for scanning by antiviruses with outdated signature databases. The general summary of the study, which was expressed by Andreas Marx, boils down to the fact that the new versions of the products catch more viruses without any serious deterioration in performance: "Compared to the 2008 generation, the new products (even in beta versions) work faster and better. It seems that the manufacturers have done serious work and, instead of simply adding new options, they have paid attention to how the antivirus behaves in the system." Marx also noted separately that the vast majority of 2009 products use the capabilities of online scanning of malicious software, which will increase the quality of detection and, accordingly, user protection. General results of the AV-Test.org test. Products are arranged in alphabetical order Notes: [*1] AVK 2008 uses the antivirus engines of Avast! and "Kaspersky" [*2] AVK 2009 uses the antivirus engines of Avast! and BitDefender [*3] WebWasher uses the Avira engine and a heuristic engine of its own development [*4] The free (for personal use) edition does not include recognition of advertising and spyware, so the result should be "--" In the results of the test, a system of conditional designations-assessments was used. For example, an antivirus product that found more than 98% of virus samples, never made a mistake when detecting clean files, and showed a signature update time of less than 2 hours in response to a new threat, received an assessment of "++". A product with 95% detection, 1-2 false positives, and a response time of up to 4 hours received a "+". 0 was given to an antivirus that caught 90% of viruses, made 3-4 mistakes, and showed a response time of 4-6 hours. "-" was given to products that showed a detection rate of slightly more than 85%, 5-6 errors, and a 6-8 hour response to a threat. "--" is for antiviruses that did not achieve these results. One of the best antiviruses in all positions was Norton Internet Security 2009 beta, which showed high results in detecting viruses (98.7%) and spyware and advertising programs (95.4%), and is updated approximately every 10 minutes (more than 6000 updates were recorded during a month of testing). The next one, Kaspersky Internet Security 2009, was updated 10 times less often, but also received high ratings in detecting malicious software (detection of malicious software – 98.4%, advertising and spyware – 98.3%). The best results (detection 99.1–99.8%) were shown by AVK 2008 and AVK 2009 from G-Data, which use scanners from Avast!Antivus, BitDefender (version 2009), and Kaspersky (version 7.0 2008). Among the outsiders of the test are the domestic Dr.Web for Windows 4.44 and the Hungarian VirusBuster Professional 10.86.1, which uses the antivirus module of the Outpost Pro line. "Doctor Web" declined to comment on the results of Andreas Marx's testing. Alexei Belkin, head of the department at Agnitum, which develops Outpost, explained the failure of the Hungarian product as "different testing conditions". He reminded CNews that the same Andreas Marx, "who recently tested Outpost Security Suite Pro 2009 for the German magazine Com! magazin (issue 10 for 2008), recorded 100% detection of viruses, spies, worms, and malicious software" in Agnitum products. Results of the AV-Test.org test. Products are arranged by the success of detecting malicious and "spyware and advertising" software At "Kaspersky Lab", one of the leaders of the test, the quality of the test is assessed "rather positively". However, Oleg Gudilin, head of the strategic marketing department of LK, noted in a conversation with CNews that "the company is currently clarifying with the authors of the test the points that are unclear to the developer". "Kaspersky", which wrote a new engine for its 2009 line, remained unclear why Andreas Marx "did not take into account the technologies for optimizing the check that exist in the products of the "Laboratory" and did not indicate the scale according to which the assessment was carried out." The developers of the Nod32 antivirus from ESET are dissatisfied with the results of the test. "The results of the AV-Test.org test have always caused mixed reactions among antivirus software developers. The fact is that the collection of malicious samples, which is the main component of such tests, is largely closed," says Grigory Vasiliev, technical director of ESET Russia. "It is highly likely that the collection contains, along with truly malicious programs, 'clean', harmless samples that have ceased to be dangerous. As strange as it may seem, the collection of the AV-Test.org resource largely consists of threats of yesterday, so the results of the test cannot be considered 100% correct." P.S. Let Witcher-L just say that Web is crap, and Nod is always the best.
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17 years ago
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Yesterday, I reinstalled Windows. Please recommend a decent free firewall or antivirus.
17 years ago
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Recently, I switched to Avast! After using Panda, I scanned my system and found several Trojans. They weren't affecting the system's performance, but there was another reason: I brought a flash drive to a friend's place, and his Kaspersky detected a Trojan and removed it. I felt a bit awkward, so I decided to check if Kaspersky was being overly cautious or if there was actually something malicious on my computer. Avast found some things that Panda hadn't. Overall, I'm satisfied with this antivirus so far, and I might even recommend it.
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17 years ago
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Amaranth, hello. (free firewall or antivirus)...))
There is such a thing as searching the internet. I recommend only avast! Antivirus.
You know, I've tried many. It's the best.
And look for ZoneAlarm. It's a decent firewall.
P/S And as for free ones, only AVP. But it's pretty bad. What you see is what you get.
P/S#2) Major Whirlwind, hello. I agree with your opinion about (Kaspersky - a paranoid), 100%. People, spring is here, everyone go outside!;)
In reply to Lux in tenebris
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17 years ago
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Symantec Endpoint Protection is installed as the primary defense; it handles its tasks adequately, though it occasionally lets something malicious slip through without alerting me:cool:
From time to time, I run an alternative check using the free Dr.Web Cureit program, which is available on the official website. Additionally, the second line of defense consists of Spybot - Search & Destroy (which protects the system from spyware) and the Anti AutoRun program, which protects the system from viruses that use Autorun files (it checks flash drives for various malicious elements).
In reply to SteN
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17 years ago
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Heh... for some reason, there's no answer option in the poll that suits me... :( . )))

I used Norton back in the day – it was quite good... and when I no longer needed an antivirus, I learned about Avast:D. And if I ever need one again, I'll definitely use it. By the way, I recently looked at the results of antivirus tests – Avast and Kaspersky are roughly on the same level, but Kaspersky has a lot of false positives. And considering that Avast is free for personal use, it's the best choice :) . All other antiviruses are significantly behind in the results of these tests; for example, NOD lags far behind in effectiveness ;).
In reply to Dr Motor
17 years ago
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I've been reading around – is anyone still using Avira Antivirus? It's a great antivirus, and I'm quite happy with it – I used to have it on XP along with Outpost Firewall. But when I upgraded to Windows 7, Outpost unfortunately failed – it caused a BSoD with even the slightest changes to the system. It took me a long time to figure out who the culprit was.
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16 years ago
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Kaspersky – mainly because it’s installed at our workplace, and I’ve gotten used to it. I haven’t noticed any false positives. It always detected the malware that was brought in on flash drives from other organizations...

Rootkits and viruses have one thing in common – neither will bring you any joy:)
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16 years ago
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I'd like to share some practical experience. In reality, viruses themselves aren't as scary as the system's vulnerability to them. The newer the operating system, the fewer problems with viruses. The other day, my boss insisted on installing a licensed Windows XP on the company's computers (we had an old, but completely legal, copy). After three days of hellish troubleshooting (I tried everything I could, including licensed Kaspersky and other antivirus software), I couldn't revive the system; it crashed 99% (it twitches occasionally and sometimes responds to clicks, but it's essentially dead). I gave up, installed a custom-built assembly by Zverev, and it works perfectly without any antivirus software. So, that's the story...

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