Antivirus, antispyware and firewall software are essential for the modern computers connected to the Internet. Despite the fact that it has been said many times, I’d like to reiterate that every computers should have some sort of protection against viruses and spyware because presence of these nasty things on the computer leads to the personal data theft, additional hardware load and system instability.
If the computer is new, then there is no excuse not to install the antivirus and the third-party firewall. That is because if the computer is fast and can bear a couple more programs running all the time and consuming some computer resources, it should at all costs be protected. There are plenty of free antivirus programs and firewalls and all-in-one solutions available, so considering the serious threat unprotected Internet connectivity can bring, there is no need to deliberately expose the computer and the data on this computer on the Internet.
If the computer is old and slow, it is usually difficult to install an antivirus and a firewall and let them run all the time. In this case I recommend to use the pre-installed Windows firewall as before but run antivirus and antispyware programs once every two weeks or once every month. In this case they won’t protect the computer at all times but at least the user will know that the computer is clean and it is safe to type the passwords, to enter the credit card numbers and to do all sorts of activity on the Internet without the fear that someone is monitoring your traffic and searches. I’m not talking here about the governments and the secret services - they can get access to the Internet traffic of a particular individual for sure and in all cases if they want to - with the help of ISPs. I’m only talking about the hackers and people who break the law by writing the viruses and spyware and using them as a gateway to read the people’s personal data and use their computers as hosts for the Internet attacks or spam email servers.
If a computer works fine, it doesn’t mean that there are no trojans or malware or viruses installed or present on it and that they’re not running at this particular moment. The opposite is also possible - say, a computer has suddenly or over time became slow and some programs now cannot be started and a computer tends to crash more often - this could just be an operation system fault, the instability cause by the corruption of the system files or some incorrect system settings but not some spyware or some viruses.
In order to figure this out, a full computer antivirus scan is required. It’s usually a good practice to install a couple of antivirus programs and do a full computer scan using each of them, obviously not at the same time. If they find something bad and rid a computer of it - fine, the thing is done, breeze free. If they don’t find anything, it means the problem lies in the operating system and the other diagnostic ways are required in order to figure out why crashes / slow running / error messages occur on a computer.
Here’s the short list of spyware, adware, malware and virus detection and removal programs I mostly use now (as of February 2009) in order to make sure the computers I work on are clean:
- AVG Antivirus
- Avast! Antivirus Home Edition
- Kaspersky Internet Security (1 month free trial)
- Spyware Doctor
- Spybot - Search and Destroy
- Windows Defender
Some firewalls also have a scanning function, for example Comodo Internet Security offers to scan the whole pc before it’s installation is complete.
February 16th, 2009 - 9:16 pm
when we want to try any software like spyware remover or anything else.Do a review of the product, just search in the internet or the best way try the product that are recommended by our friends or person that already used the products and satisfied with the performanced of the products. =)
February 17th, 2009 - 6:45 am
I like Avast.. It works well with me..
February 18th, 2009 - 12:21 pm
What about nod? It haven’t disappointed me yet, but I can’t say anything about others
February 19th, 2009 - 4:23 pm
Your article really helped my system from virus and spyware. Thank you for posting this article.
February 20th, 2009 - 5:58 am
for my SOHO avast works best……………and for my home………….vista is not taking any remover…….what will you say to this?
February 20th, 2009 - 7:59 am
Great post, Thank you! viva la open source
February 21st, 2009 - 2:01 pm
i use avast in my computer, avast is very good . .
February 23rd, 2009 - 1:31 am
As far as free Antivirus programs go, Avast is the best. It offers one of the most important features and that is: Automatic Updates!
Many computer users have installed (older) antivirus programs thinking they were safe. Without current database virus definition files, you are still vulnerable to attack as new virus programs are written everyday!
Although I currently use Norton Antivirus, Avast offers a great auto update feature as a free basic virus scan software.
Prevention is the key however, and that means staying away from
rogue sites and not opening emails that you do not recognize or look suspect.
February 24th, 2009 - 2:44 am
I used to use just Spybot as my anti-spyware tool. I discovered it does actually miss out on a lot.
I use SUPERAntiSpyware now as well. It has proved itself to be very good, and pick up on a lot of stuff Spybot doesn’t.
As a computer technician, It’s a great tool for me!
I use and encourage my clients to use Avira Antivir. It’s fast, efficient, and free forever! Better than Avast and AVG, and yes i’ve tested those too!
February 24th, 2009 - 8:03 am
@Amma: Yes, you’re right - NOD32 is a good antivirus and a lot of my friend use it to protect their pcs. It’s not free but there’s 30-day free trial period.
February 25th, 2009 - 8:29 am
on the list you’ve given, what’s the cheapest so far?
pc computers are more dependent on antivirus protection, how about apple computers?
~by coffee barista
February 25th, 2009 - 1:17 pm
@Coffee man without the name:
(1) It’s an article about free antivirus protection, not the paid one. If you’re an individual, I don’t see the point of buying an antivirus solution if there are good free ones around.
(2) My understanding is that Apple computers are influenced by viruses and spyware to much lesser extent than pcs. That is because pcs are used by the majority of population and hackers prefer to write viruses for them to target the bigger audience. That’s why Apple hasn’t been the focus of this article.
February 25th, 2009 - 4:39 pm
Of that list the best is kaspersky, and I would add Trend Micro to that list, and I would remove AVG, that antivirus is really bad quality in my own experience.
Thanks for the tips. I’m bookmarking your blog, I love it!!
February 26th, 2009 - 5:27 pm
I have had a lot of good luck with AVG. I feel it does a better job than McAffe or Norton. I had norton on and when I installed AVG it caught between 10 and 20 moderate to high risk files. Only problem I have had with AVG is when system files get corrupted or Viruses are made to look like system files AVG will not or can’t delete them.
February 27th, 2009 - 4:12 am
I’ve been recently undergoing many computer troubles. Reformatting deteriorates my PC’s performance. Thanks a lot for posting this blog.