antivirus

Win an ESET NOD32 AntiVirus 4 license

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ESET NOD32Anti-virus is a must have piece of software if you own a computer, and ESET’s NOD32 is one of the top choices for home users. It’s not a free application, but if you act now, you have a chance to win one of 10 licenses that our friends at Tech Paul are giving away this week.

Even if you don’t enter the contest, Tech Paul is worth a visit (or two!).

PS> Don’t mess around if you don’t have an AV program already – get one. Now! There are free ones as well that get the basic job done – we like AVG.

Microsoft close to releasing free Anti-Virus product

Networking & Internet, Software / By /

Once Microsoft saw that their OneCare Live security product flopped, they decided back in November 08 to produce a scaled down version that would be free. The new application, codenamed Morro, is basic anti-virus that combats viruses, spyware and trojans.

While MS says this is not intended to compete with likes of Symantec and McAfee, they obviously will on the low-end of the product lines, but not with the security suites that those companies offer.

For whatever reasons MS decided to do this, it’s a good thing for consumers. In fact, I’d like to see something like this bundled with the OS, preconfigured to auto-update, and difficult for end-users to disable. Computer security, particularly on consumer machines, is in a terrible state. Many users simply don’t know or understand the dangers well enough (or at all) and this is bad for them and the rest of the Net.

Morro will go into beta soon and will roll out later this year.

Conficker Worm wakes up; Check your AV and patches

Computers, Networking & Internet, Software / By /

AV researchers noticed that the Conficker worm ‘woke up’ and has started replicating a piece of data among infected computers. It is still unknown what this mystery payload is, but it could be something as dangerous as a keylogger.

Bottom line is that you should check your Windows systems again for up to date virus definitions and security patches. You should also make use of a couple of free online checks: the Conficker Eye Chart (makes sense when you see it) and another test at the University of Bonn.

Trustware’s BufferZone separates files and applications

Computers, Miscellaneous / By /

As a follow-up to our piece on the Conficker C worm, a vendor called Trustware sent us news about their product (BufferZone) which can arguably be classified as an Anti-Virus app, but doesn’t quite work like the typical AV program. BufferZone claims to prevent malicious code from installing on your system by placing it into its own little virtual container and away from data and operating system files.

I wonder somewhat about the performance of a virtualization app as compared to a real-time virus scanner, but you can take BufferZone for a free 30-day test drive and find out for yourself.

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