What is your favorite antivirus/firewall software?

[Flabbergasted]

I've been having an unusual rash of trojans lately.

I used Zone Alarm free and AVG free for a long time but recently started using Comodo Firewall and Avira Antivir also free with rave results. Although spybot is good for what it is I rarely find it finds anything ever.

[msongs]

1. antivir and comodo here too....avg was too bloated and ZA no good for 64 bit nt

[Flabbergasted]

2. ZA is no good for 64 bit. I had not heard that?

[tabatha]

3. I was using AVG but it did too may disk acesses, and drove

me nuts. I read a thread started by DainBramaged (?) on which someone mentioned Prevx. I bought it, and it found a couple things that AVG did not.

DainBramaged wrote a report of some antivirus testing he had done. I don't have the link, but it was quite interesting.

[usregimechange]

4. AVG free

[budkin]

5. Recently switched from AVG free to Avast free

[StarfarerBill]

54. AVG Free and Comodo.

[Ron Green]

6. Mac OSX works for me.

[imdjh]

7. lol. beat me to it. nt

[phasma ex machina]

11. +1 close enough nt

[Sherman A1]

47. +1

Well Said!

[TicketyBoo]

53. Yep.

Me, too.

[ShortnFiery]

8. McAfee because it's FREE with ...

a Comcast cable internet connection contract.

However, I wish there were COMPETITION among cable providers.

[Ishka Kibble]

49. Same here.

But my wife's desktop went nuts a few months ago, and she (a DUer herself) went to the Computer Forum, where the people there went far out of their way to help her. One person, in fact, had had the exact same virus infect her computer, and was able to walk my wife through the whole process of locating and quarantining the little monster.

One thing she recommended, and we've since put it on all our computers is malwarebytes, a terrific piece of freeware available at www.malwarebytes.org. I run it once a week, and this morning, it found 10 little bugs - AdAware things - that it handily wiped out, and now my computer is as clean and dainty as a Roman Catholic bride at her wedding Mass.

Well, maybe that wasn't the most apt image to call up, but seriously, get yourself some malwarebytes. It's out in front of Comcast by miles, even though Comcast does a nice job of protecting us here.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

9. AVG Free + the built-in firewall in my 2Wire router

The grc.com Website (Gibson Research Corporation) and its free "Shields Up" scan is the best place to see how well your firewall is performing. I get "full stealth" results when I test mine:

https://www.grc.com/default.htm

[Flabbergasted]

17. I'm not goint to end up with a Trojan if I download that am I? ;-) nt

[Flabbergasted]

37. Thanks for that. I went through and tested everything and came out peachy. nt

[ohheckyeah]

10. I get McAfee free with Comcast, but I used it even before I

got it for free. I don't remember ever having a virus get by it.

[cowcommander]

12. Common Sense Edition 2009

With cool advanced features such as don't-visit-shady-websites, delete-unsolicited-email, know-what-you're-actually-downloading and my favorite feature of them all STOP-USING-INTERNET-EXPLORER-AND-GET-ANOTHER-WEB-BROWSER!

That said, I do use Avira, Malwarebytes, Lavasoft Ad-Aware and Spybot just in case. They're all for free, paying for antivirus/antispyware software is for chumps. B-)

[Flabbergasted]

16. WOW I'm going to have to try that!!!! nt

[gateley]

13. I have a Mac.

Smug bitch, I know. :hi:

[imdjh]

18. my 266 still flies on photoshop and quark

[GOPisEvil]

14. I use Avast.

It's free and works well.

[Jim Sagle]

15. ESET.

[Adsos Letter]

35. Same here.

[Old Codger]

19. Kaspersky

AV, Firewall, anti spam, anti malware, content filtering, and very very light foot print, easy on disc access and keeps up to date constantly. Kaspersky is one of the oldest AV around.

[Swamp Rat]

20. OS X, LINUX, UNIX

Never had a virus, trojan, etc. in 29 years on those systems.

I use AVG Free for my poor widdle Windoze XP partitions. :D

[azurnoir]

24. don't forget "linux for humans" known as Ubuntu

it is a GUI for linux and pretty decent

[Swamp Rat]

25. I'm running Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty on 3 of my machines right now.

;)

[azurnoir]

21. two suggestions

the first is Peer Guardian which is a really brute force firewall

http://phoenixlabs.org/pg2/

it can be interesting and sometimes disturbing as to who is trying to have a look see at your computer

and the second is not either a firewall or antiviral it is privacy software and also quite interesting

it is Tor

http://www.torproject.org/

and a third is Malwarebytes

http://www.malwarebytes.org/

[Flabbergasted]

33. It does sound interesting...I'm trying out PeerGuardian but i struggled to get it to work on

vista 64 and now it won't download 3 of the 4 lists.

Does Tor slow down your computer?

[azurnoir]

40. PG2 does that sometimes with the lists

not sure why, be warned though it does not like any ad heavy sites like yahoo, ebay ect

Tor and PG2 will conflict I should have said that sorry as PG2 will block some of the Tor network so do not run them at the same time, as for Tor slowing your computer not to my experience but if you decide to run as a relay it can take up some bandwidth however there are menus for controlling that and also if you are on mozilla with Tor enabled mozilla has a button for that the google home page will come up in the language of what ever country you are being routed through the problem only seems to occur with mozilla not google chrome

[mvd]

22. AntiVir is very good, and the free version..

recently had its update problems addressed. Don't like Comodo's tactics, but the firewall isn't bad. Right now I'm trying out the beta of Avast Internet Security 5.

[Cleita]

23. Get an Apple?

I actually have Windows XP on a partition. If I want to go to iffy sites I go through Windows. If I get a virus, I delete the whole thing and reinstall. It's really easy.

[1]

26. zone alarm. i have never had a virus, or a trojan... but then i don't visit odd sites...

i don't open .exe files that claim to show levi johnston nude pictures.

maybe its not so much about your software, but more about your character...

[Flabbergasted]

30. What Antivirus software do you use? nt

[1]

34. none. avg was installed on the machine. it never caught anything. i tried spybot...

but that pegged my cpu at 100% all of the time analyzing all of the files on my computer (teaparty.exe or some such.)

i disabled the anti-virus software. zonealarm prevents any problems.

but like i say, i don't visit odd sites. i don't open .exe files. i have never in 20+ years had a problem...

just lucky i guess...

[snagglepuss]

42. LOL

My character must be sterling.

[1]

43. fight off the viruses as you must, bud. i don't get infected. you do what you have to do...

[snagglepuss]

45. Well I've never been called bud before. You may want to find

something relaxing to download because I simply thought your coment about what's his face was humourous however it seems you were serious. oops.

[1]

46. be safe, bud. the internet contains a particle of risk. a lot like life...

[Feron]

27. My best security advice:

1. Make sure that you have all the important Windows updates. Microsoft issues updates the second Tuesday of every month. A lot of vulnerabilities that malware uses to infect your computer have already been patched.

2. Don't use IE as your primary browser. Use Firefox, Opera, or another browser instead. The reason being is that most malware uses Active-X to infect your computer. Plus IE is tied into the operating system.

3. When using Firefox, I use the No Script and Ad block plus extensions. No Script allows you to control what scripts run on a page and you can whitelist scripts on sites that you visit frequently. You can also temporarily enable scripts.

Opera is my primary browser and I use Fanboy's Adblock list for it.

Sometimes legit ad servers can be hacked into and will serve ads that will infect your computer.

4. Keep Java up to date. The Vundo trojan, for example, uses vulnerabilities in older versions of Java to infect your computer.

Also make sure to go to add/remove programs and remove all older versions of Java. For some reason the installer doesn't remove the older versions. You just need one copy for everything to run and the older versions will still leave you vulnerable.

5. I use McAfee because it's free with my ISP and my computer runs faster with it. What you have should be fine.

Just make sure to scan things before opening. And to keep your definitions and program updated.

Typically I do a full system scan once a week.

6. Stay away from warez, cracks, and serial/key generators.

7. Uncheck "Hide extensions for known file types" in Windows Explorer.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-vista/Show-or-hide-file-name-extensions

Sometimes malware will be hidden as badjuju.exe.jpg. All you will see is something that is supposed to be a picture, but isn't showing up so you're inclination will be to click on it. This way you will be better able to detect if something you downloaded might be malware.

8. RSS or occasionally pop into the DSL Reports Security forum. http://www.dslreports.com/forum/security

I'm not affiliated, but I've learned a lot of things lurking over there for the past few years.

[Flabbergasted]

31. Thanks. I just prefer ie more than firefox so I've been using it on this new computer...

It's a little more user friendly than ff. How is Opera?

[tXr]

28. Avast free+Malwarebytes+Windows firewall on my Windows box, Linux Mint & Kubuntu on the rest.

Router with a built-in firewall for all.

[sudopod]

29. Linux

lol

[Kablooie]

32. Zicam works for me.

[Greyhound]

36. I switched to Comodo and Avast on my windoze box, and they work well.

But I only use a very locked-down Win 2K Pro. I looked at XP and found it to be far more difficult to control, and Vista... well let's just say I've told my dad that I won't fix his laptop again unless he puts Ubuntu on it.

It seems a 5-year-old can script through that POS.

[SaveOurDemocracy]

38. Great freeware d/ls at this link:

MajorGeeks 'Must have FREE downloads'

http://www.majorgeeks.com/page.php?id=20


I use ALL freeware programs and have had great success with the ones I run:

Advanced System Care 3
Malwarebytes Anti-Malware
Avast! Home Edition
Iobit SmartDefrag
CCleaner Slim

and...Windows firewall

[Sgent]

39. Norton

I know everyone will think I've lost my mind, but...

The new version of norton is a significant change (replacement) of their scanning engine. It is now one of the most lightweight and effective antivirus programs in existence.

Take a loot at www.av-comparatives.org which does the most in depth testing of any website I've seen.

[thenooch]

41. I fly...

Commando....

I use my lapper as a surfboard, if I get an itch, I re-load XP.

[Liquorice]

44. Zone Alarm Pro and Norton. I never have any problems. nt

[gleaner]

48. McAfee by far....

I get internet via cable and we have two computers hooked up to a router. It provides firewall, spy ware and network protection for a reasonable price and it doesn't gum up windows like some of the other virus software that we have used.

It has intercepted many Trojans and if you come under attack, you can lock down the firewall immediately to prevent further damage. It is actually a good product. Maybe they haven't outsourced anything yet.;)

[John N Morgan]

50. LINUX

[madokie]

51. linux mint:-)

[DailyGrind51]

52. McAfee Security Suite has kept my HP, virus and spyware totally free!

[juno jones]

55. I like Avast.

I've had several warnings in the last week and Avast won't even let them load. I also use malwarebytes, search and destroy, and a little tool from Greatis called 'reanimator' which is a great last resort (although you need either a good idea of your own registry or some guidance, which is free at their site, to use it).

I've had alarms coming up a lot recently on sites that are usually OK and I think it's from the banner ads. Either they're somehow malicious or their script is getting picked up as a threat. I have no idea whose ads they are, my avast won't let them load in, LOL! :)

Good luck with the trojans, you're not the first person I've seen complain about them lately. :hi:

[L0oniX]

56. KASPERSKY ...not a virus or trojan in over 15 years.