Anti virus

[hardy49]

In this morning's Daily Telegraph it says that one way to save money is not to buy anti virus software as you can download it for free.
Whtatdo you all think of this - is it true ? We would love to download for free but are rather concerned as we do our banking online as well as much of our shopping.
We should like your opinions please as to whether or not you think it is safe and which are the best downloads ?

[squarebear]

I scan my machine for free once in a while over at http://www.antivirus.com I don't see any point in buying something when it is free on the net. AVG is supposed to be a good free anti-virus too but I've never used that one to comment.

[SKA]

I tired downloading AVG but it doesn't download for me!!

[Doc Spock]

They are quite right. The free stuff is excellent and much better than norton.

Check out previous posts and look out for advice from Ethel.

AVG from Grisost is great.

Spybot search and destroy.

I have also used the freebies from google, ie, spyware doctor

Check previous posts by ETHEL.

[pauln90]

See previous answers to this question with good suggestions from Ethel.

Many people find these solutions work as well as paid for options

http://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/Technology/Ques tion480203.html

[hardy49]

Many thanks to you all for your comments

[Ethel]

I am VERY belt and braces and have been accused of having too much security on all my pcs - but it works for me.

All of my security software is free legal downloads - the firewall and anti virus run continually without my having to do anything, whilst some ot the other programs have to be run manually every so often. It;s a Sunday morning job - no hardship and I can use the pc as normal while it's all going on.

I find the information here extremely useful - and it has all the to the downloads. I guarantee all links are safe and up to date:

http://tinyurl.com/y83v23

[ACtheTROLL]

no prog ever gets 100%
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/labs/155/antivirus-soft ware/products.html

avg always scores well in the value for money section (as you'd expect) ... but not in detection. (in recent tests it scored only 83%) .... http://www.pcpro.co.uk/labs/120451/avg-antivir us-free-edition.html

the free version scans for viruses ... but doesn't have real time protection .... so the time taken to neutralise the infection depends on the user's scanning timetable

AVIRA is now the freebie "darling" in the mags (PCPro & PCW) with a 92% detection rate
but again ... no real time protection
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/labs/120448/kaspersky-antivirus-7.html

all the bought versions DO provide real time scanning
Kaspersky scored 98% (the kasdpersky engine is also used by steganos which costs less and got the same results)

and Noron 360 is on the most wanted list for PCPro (it IS expensive though)
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/reviews/110678/norton-3 60.html

the mags generally don't have an axe to grind .... and test quite thoroughly - my money is with them ... their recommendation is far more reliable than ours in this sort of area

It all depends on you habits ... if all you ever do is listen to the archers .... and do a little banking ... a freebie is sufficient

if your tastes are a little less conservative ... real time scanning starts to look a little better

and there is a school of thought amongst security professionals that says ... as long as you

[ACtheTROLL]

oops!
don't keep precious or sentitive data on the PC ... don't bother with any type of protection .... just accept that when your machine slows to unacceptable levels .. you re-build it

[whiffey]

I use AVG from Grisoft, Spybot, and Microsoft's own malicious software removal tool.

For any online financial stuff however, I boot the PC into Linux from a CD. It is available free, but for convenience I bought SUSE Linux (Novell) in PC World, about �25. I reckon that the PC running in this way is about as safe as can be. Always remember a few golden rules, in particular always type the URL of your internet banking, and never ever reply to links or emails requesting your details. They are ALWAYS fake.

[hardy49]

Thanks again to you all