Moronic response. I gave statements based on facts and others testing and research and evidence that exists. You respond with this usual bull**** from bluepills like yourself.

Yeah ....ok

The greatest issue with Windows is the UAC is effectively useless (many people instinctively ignore it) and even on a very locked-down system, users still get way too many privileges at the system level. Malware takes advantage of this.

I've always said this it pops up so often people just ignore it anyway.

anti virus are pretty much useless data collection is more of a risk than getting hacked , you can say an anti virus is ok for people who have no common sense and click and download anything , but google microsoft facebook your isp there all in the money game and worse than hackers really coz they do anything to get your personal data, and when they harvest data like this and get every drop off info about you if they get hacked its gonna expose all your info even bank accounts you have never used online ,best thing you can do to protect yourself on the internet is use a good quality vpn to try stop data collection

Errr, what?!.. It's like saying condoms don't reduce the chance of getting STD... Of course there are numerous viruses and threats, and no preventive system can fight all of them, but it is utterly idiotic to claim that "no protection" is the best choice! I guess, servers under the supervision of this "genius" don't have Antivirus systems... so may be it's time to close all Google accounts and move elsewhere. Alternatively I believe Google has to find a new Security engineer ASAP.

Agreed. Ignore the keyboard cowboys.

inb4 google release their own antivirus software..... :P

...I personally would rather have 100 viruses than any of the AV programs available....

What?! :funny: Dude, you just made my day... Personally, I don't remember last time I've stumbled on virus while surfing the web (OK, I remember, read further), I'm visiting some 10, 15 sites that are quite safe, download programs only from manufacturers sites and KAV (home) and KIS (work) doesn't have much to do while I'm using the computers, but... But few months ago on one of my rigs at work I've downloaded latest Classic Shell 4.3.0 from official site http://www.classicshell.net/ for one of our clients to install it on his Win8.1 and right after download (before even starting the install process) KIS heuristic protection on my rig screamed that something suspicious is going on with this file, WTF!? Clients rig with Win8.1 + Windows Defender, same official site and same file downloaded few minutes later: Windows Defender didn't found nothing. Earlier that day, some few hours before, I've already downloaded CS4.3.0 from the same site and KIS didn't found nothing. Just to be on the safe side I've decided to digg that previously downloaded CS4.3.0 installation file from one of my USB drives, copied it to my rig with KIS: nothing, KIS said file is safe. Used that earlier downloaded installation on clients rig and everything went fine. Few days later, bang!!! Aug 2nd, 2016 - The Classic Shell download service was hacked KIS saved my ass that day thats for sure... The real reason why I'm using KAV at home and KIS at work is because from my personall experience most of users here don't give a f**k what's going on with their PCs, where they or their kids surf on the web, what they download, where they plug in their USB flash-drives, USB hard-drives... PCs at schools here are INSANELY INFECTED with all kinds of nasty viruses, my kids already know that because EVERY SINGLE TIME when they bring some of their USB flash-drive to finish school projects at at home all of those drives are infected with only God knows what. KAV on kids computers is doing it's job just perfect to keep those rigs safe, unlike PCs of most of their friends who need to complete reinstall their rigs every once in a while because all kinds of nasty stuff rendered those rigs to the point of unusability every few months. Also I don't thrust ANYONE who brings his USB flash-drive or USB hard-drive to me to copy/print some stuff: "...it's viruss-free, don't worry mate!..." My ass virus-free!!! 7-8 of of 10 times those drives are infected with all kinds of viruses, autorun malware... So for those who said you don't need AV software, common sense is the best protection and what not: good luck with that, either you keep your PCs under the glass bell or you don't have friends/people around you who every now and then bring their portable storage to plug in those into some of your PCs for all kinds of reasons.

What?! :funny: Dude, you just made my day...

The average virus is less annoying to me, takes less money from me, and slows my computer down less than a program such as Norton. In my experience, it takes a little more than 50 viruses on a crappy dual-core system to start doing more "damage" than AV programs.

Personally, I don't remember last time I've stumbled on virus while surfing the web (OK, I remember, read further), I'm visiting some 10, 15 sites that are quite safe, download programs only from manufacturers sites and KAV (home) and KIS (work) doesn't have much to do while I'm using the computers, but...

Likewise. I don't use almost anything for protection, though, I primarily do most of my web-browsing in Linux. In the event I or someone else does encounter a virus, I've found the Kaspersky live CD is a great tool for removing the threat. KAV in Windows, though modestly effective, is way too heavy for the average PC, and a bit expensive.

Few days later, bang!!! Aug 2nd, 2016 - The Classic Shell download service was hacked KIS saved my ass that day thats for sure...

Yes, except it was already too late. That other PC already experienced a problem that KIS explicitly did not find on time. Having a bulletproof vest isn't going to save you from being shot if you put it on after the gun has already been fired.

PCs at schools here are INSANELY INFECTED with all kinds of nasty viruses, my kids already know that because EVERY SINGLE TIME when they bring some of their USB flash-drive to finish school projects at at home all of those drives are infected with only God knows what. KAV on kids computers is doing it's job just perfect to keep those rigs safe

I'm sure those school PCs have some form of AV on them, which further proves my point that it doesn't do it's job. Back when I was in highschool, each computer would get a clean slate from a disk image overnight every other day, because it was easier to just purge the system than to deal with malware. Anyway, I don't understand how you can logically say KAV is doing it's job perfect when you just admitted a moment ago that KAV/KIS failed to identify a virus on time. Just because it didn't find something, that doesn't mean it's doing a good job.

Also I don't thrust ANYONE who brings his USB flash-drive or USB hard-drive to me to copy/print some stuff: "...it's viruss-free, don't worry mate!..." My ass virus-free!!! 7-8 of of 10 times those drives are infected with all kinds of viruses, autorun malware...

That there is very good practice. Though when push comes to shove and you need to use one of these drives, I would recommend you try getting a Linux live CD to read or grab whatever you need from the drive. Being Linux greatly decreases the chances of a binary spreading. Being a live OS means even if the malware triggers, it's all in memory and you can easily abort without any real damage. Being on a CD makes it impossible for the malware to write to anything.

So for those who said you don't need AV software, common sense is the best protection and what not: good luck with that, either you keep your PCs under the glass bell or you don't have friends/people around you who every now and then bring their portable storage to plug in those into some of your PCs for all kinds of reasons.

When you interpret things the way you are, it's no wonder why you thought what I said was stupid. There are multiple forms of protection: full-time, predictive, manual, and reactive. Whether it's the AWD system in your car, a medication for a disease, an automatic volume control for your sound system, or protecting your PC, reactive systems are inherently less effective. There will always be a moment of weakness. When that weakness is exploited, very often the damage is done. AV programs are reactive. A full-time system is either inefficient or crippling, but guarantees good results. So in terms of malware, that would be something like the entire system but the user folder being locked down (much like unix-like systems). A predictive system (such as a firewall) will protect you before something suspicious gets the chance to activate. Much like a literal firewall, the fire/threat may still exist, but it can't get through. Manual is where you just go ahead and let the problem happen and take care of it yourself. Generally a stupid idea.

money is the only thing really u can lose if a personal pc gets hacked and they can only get that password u have used on that pc so if you have a credit card bank account u just opened to use online and only put money on there the day you gonna buy something and rest time just keep a little money on there ur never gonna lose much even u did get hacked the issue for me is main bank acounts which never are used online with your savings money in the only way u can lose money there is by the bank getting hacked or data collection thats the biggest risk i care about

@SirDremor then why are ppl walking into stores like microcenter/bestbuy/staples etc, to get infections removed? from around 800 computers that i fixed in a 7 month time frame (when actively working as tech), more than 80% were infected. If AVs would work (out of the box) that would not be the case. But the best joke was their scanning software (Norton), which missed around 50-80% of spy/malware running on the tested system, when malwarebytes/superantispyware had no trouble finding/removing it. So for most users it would NOT be an improvement using an AV, if the machine still gets infected.. And no, comparing software to condoms is a joke. i can secure wipe my system drive and clean install any OS 1 min later. How does that work with STD or pregnancy? right...

As long as back doors are built into the os, nothing will ever be 100% secure, never mind the vulnerabilities that are found. We live in a paranoid world where the higher-ups want access to everything we do that they can get their hands on. The more security we want, the less freedom we have. There is no compromise here. This is justified when they find terrorists amongst the populace and tell us they've been following them for X amount of time and caught X number of terrorists plotting X number of terrorist activities. I don't think it's possible to go "off the grid" if you continue to use the internet in any way.

Cool story, but i will continue to use NOD32.

So correct me if I am wrong, if someone came here saying they had symptoms of a malware or virus the general advice here would be to do nothing? Correct me if I am wrong but the general solution for folk asking for this advice will be do a scan with THIS program or do a scan with THAT program and more often than not a lot of these programs come with their own real time protection systems. So what are the folk that say these programs are useless really saying, do nothing if you suspect malware or virus? Reinstall and start over?

So correct me if I am wrong, if someone came here saying they had symptoms of a malware or virus the general advice here would be to do nothing? Correct me if I am wrong but the general solution for folk asking for this advice will be do a scan with THIS program or do a scan with THAT program and more often than not a lot of these programs come with their own real time protection systems. So what are the folk that say these programs are useless really saying, do nothing if you suspect malware or virus? Reinstall and start over?

the last hacking attack they used webcams the software which you think is a legit safe software so i think point is an anti virus nowadays is pretty useless dont protect you, if you have windows 10 its collecting your data and your anti virus is allowing it so again not protcting you and if you think your pc is infected then yes best fix is wipe your drives and reinstall your o.s

Google (or alphabet) represent all that is bad and evil in science and internet... i agree on one point: viruses are less used since plishing ransomware and net attack are more lucrative :bang: a good knowledge is the best AV you can have. for the rest you have avast, kaspersky, nod etc (yes QT, java, flash and adobe craps are obsolete and massive hole in system security too)

Most of the conversation in the thread is completely off. He was talking about servers, or systems that run infrastructure, not desktop users. "Those things, are according to Bilby, virus scanners and intrusion detection systems. Instead he wants “security types” to focus on whitelisting, hardware security keys and dynamic access rights" In systems like that, or anything with a specific purpose, whitelisting and correct access rights are orders of magnitude safer than leaving things open and hope for the best that the AV can do. In modern computers with users that don't pirate, a router-based adblock/malware domain block would be much more effective than any antivirus. And for people who love to live dangerously, a list like that on the router/computer level, along with a preemptive scan of everything with Malwarebytes and a check on the startup tab of Task Manager and in the Task Scheduler, should cover 99.999% of malware. If it doesn't, then a government is after you and good luck with that 😀

So correct me if I am wrong, if someone came here saying they had symptoms of a malware or virus the general advice here would be to do nothing? Correct me if I am wrong but the general solution for folk asking for this advice will be do a scan with THIS program or do a scan with THAT program and more often than not a lot of these programs come with their own real time protection systems. So what are the folk that say these programs are useless really saying, do nothing if you suspect malware or virus? Reinstall and start over?

For me, that's not at all what I'm implying. As stated in my last post, you don't want a reactive tool, which is what AV programs are. You want something that stops the problem in it's tracks, before it arrives. There are plenty of methods that can do this. AV is only useful once the problem has manifested.

Most of the conversation in the thread is completely off. He was talking about servers, or systems that run infrastructure, not desktop users. "Those things, are according to Bilby, virus scanners and intrusion detection systems. Instead he wants “security types” to focus on whitelisting, hardware security keys and dynamic access rights" In systems like that, or anything with a specific purpose, whitelisting and correct access rights are orders of magnitude safer than leaving things open and hope for the best that the AV can do. In modern computers with users that don't pirate, a router-based adblock/malware domain block would be much more effective than any antivirus. And for people who love to live dangerously, a list like that on the router/computer level, along with a preemptive scan of everything with Malwarebytes and a check on the startup tab of Task Manager and in the Task Scheduler, should cover 99.999% of malware. If it doesn't, then a government is after you and good luck with that 😀

if he works for google hes only there for the money anyway edward snowden says to protect yourself online dont use facebook and google, remeber all the public is paying montly the isp , without the home user there would be no google or facebook etc

Java/Flash etc. are borderline pointless. Java even more so as v10 will be their last version. Everyone knows that - talk about stating the obvious. Funny comment coming from someone at Google/Alphabet - how many holes have been fixed in Android over the last year then? What about your massive fragmentation problem? No? Ok!

if he works for google hes only there for the money anyway edward snowden says to protect yourself online dont use facebook and google, remeber all the public is paying montly the isp , without the home user there would be no google or facebook etc

This was in a hacking convention. Successful people are never successful like that if they're only in it for the "money". Their investors are, but almost never the inventors themselves. Also Snowden never really said that, he only said that companies had to comply due to the FISA court. And there is a consortium of companies that has taken the US government to (the hidden) court for that reason.

flash is no longer installed on my pc's neither is java I Still wont go on internet without adblocker, and AV better to have it and not need it, then need it and not have it both can stop stupid from happening when stupid clicks things they shouldnt. yes AV no longer as effective as they use to be, but it better then using nothing. nor was AV ever ment to be able to stop hackers. it for virus/malware/trojan protection which again is better then using nothing.