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Virus Bulletin threw the programs in a ring with around 3,000 unique samples of malware spread across four categories: Polymorphic viruses, Trojans, WildList viruses and Worms/bots. Of the 35 tested, only 23 passed, meaning about a third of the products fell to the tests. Among the more known solutions is Symantec's Endpoint Protection, which missed two infections on the Wildlist.
Symantec was quick to defend itself in response to Ars Technicia's original coverage of the Virus Bulletin tests. A company spokesperson said that "In the past ten years, Symantec has earned 44 consecutive VB100 awards, something no other vendor has come close to matching." They went on to add that the missed malware is an "extremely rare replicant of a highly polymorphic file infecting virus" and that they have since fixed the issue in their signatures.
You can check out the test in full on Virus Bulletin's website, although I believe you need a subscription. Ars Technica has created a condensed list of the results which you can view after the jump.
- Pass: AhnLab V3 Internet Security, Alwil avast! Professional, AVG Internet Security, Avira AntiVir Professional, CA eTrust ITM, eEye Blink Professional, ESET NOD32 Antivirus, Fortinet FortiClient, Frisk F-PROT antivirus, F-Secure Client Security, F-Secure PSB Workstation Security, G DATA AntiVirus 2010, Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2009, Kingsoft Internet Security 2009 Advanced, McAfee Total Security, McAfee VirusScan Enterprise, Microsoft Forefront Client Security, MWTI eScan Internet Security Suite, Nifty Corp. Security24, Norman Security Suite, Quick Heal AntiVirus Lite 2009, Sophos Anti-Virus, and Trustport Antivirus 2009.
- Fail: Agnitum Outpost Security Suite Pro (one false positive), CA Internet Security Suite (960 polymorphic viruses misses), Filseclab Twister AntiTrojanVirus (2612 wildlist misses, 38 false positives), Finport Simple Anti-Virus (2897 wildlist misses, two false positives), K7 Total Security Desktop (one false positive), Kingsoft Internet Security 2009 Standard (228 wildlist misses), PC Tools AntiVirus 2009 (1188 wildlist misses, one false positive), PC Tools Internet Security 2009 (1355 wildlist misses, one false positive), PC Tools Spyware Doctor (1355 wildlist misses, one false positive), Rising Internet Security 2009 (43 wildlist misses, one false positive), Symantec Endpoint Protection (two wildlist misses), and VirusBuster Professional (one false positive).
User Comments: 31
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Symantec, in my experience, has always failed as an Antivirus. Everytime I have ever used it I have received loads of false positives. Not to mention, it is a major resource hog. Since I was told about Avast professional 3 years ago, I have refused to look back.
I did an internal company review of Avast and convinced my enterprise level company to switch from McAfee to Avast as well. The switch reduced server workload and helped my IT department to increase productivity, and focus on other problems rather than chasing down user downloaded viruses and running daily spyware tests.
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HaMsTeYr said:
What about Bitdefender....? Its not even tested? Why? Its one of the higher rather AVs...
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What EMSI A-Squared? I found it best, and I think it is Europe's highest-rated. Have found Norton to be the worst by far. Does gates own part of all of Norton?
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Staff
@hamsteyr: I could be very wrong, but I am pretty sure that AV companies have to submit their product to be tested - in which case it would be BitDefender's fault for not being included
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Thanks for the clarification there, Matt. I was wondering that (hamsteyr's comment) as well. I have used McAfee, Norton, and Symantec...all I would say did not fit the bill (especially McAfee...what total rubbish). I am currently using BitDefender and have been satisfied (although their customer support is weak and they pretty much have no support yet for Win7). On my Win7 machine I am using Avira (free) which also seems to be very good.
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tengeta said:
This is why Norton had to be forced onto peoples PC's in the first place, they suck, they know it, they just hope you deal with it.
Gee, and now its Opera's turn to play that game.
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Some of the companies with a pass mark can be had in a free version. Not bad at all. The copies of Sophos that my company owns offers free home versions to employees. This can be a good deal. My ISP offers McAfee for free as well. I think that the days of paid for home anti-virus are numbered.
Symantec: "But, we have awards showing that we used to be a good product!"
From my past experience cleaning up friends and company computer systems, Symantec's is easily taken down by most viruses leaving a system vulnerable. And, as Wendig0 points out, Symantec is a resource hog as it takes over a system providing you this false feeling of security. I had thought that Endpoint would be their return, but they got lazy. And the new engine wasn't that impressive.
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I have been computing since 1997 and never had an AV installed on my system. Never had a issue as well. I almost never download softwares from unknown sites/users.
Not saying my system is not protected, i use firefox with noscript and also run a freeware ProcessGuard to control all the processes running on my system.
AV softwares are memory hogging and too intrusive. IMO these AV companies themselves make/spread viruses and threats to keep their business on the roll. I just dont trust them.
Waqas
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Any feedback on Sophos?
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I am curious to see how free programs such as Avast fair in these tests
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i think it's atrocious that people believe that if they stick to "safe" sites that they will never have any problems!! HELLO - don't you know that sites can get hacked??!!! all it takes is one trojan embedded in the favicon of a site to compromise your system and you won't even know it. hmmm.... you don't have any A/V or A/M and you say you've never had a problem....... coincidence?? unless they want to destroy your system, they DON'T WANT YOU TO KNOW! [/ranting_at_the_retards]
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I agree! I've been using the Residential (free) Avast! for several years and have had terrific success with it. It has even identified corrupt files!
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Leafgreen said:
I've tested many AV and AM proggies. Symantec is a bad neighbor, not wanting to play fair with too many other proggies. I'm currently happy with Eset NOD32 Antivirus. And I got a good rebate on it through one of the stores at http://PaymentKey.com.
Hope that helps yous.
Leafgreen
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Eset Nod32 for the win!!
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I use AVG, Ad-Aware, Spyboy Search & Destroy and ZoneAlarm, and this combination has worked fine for me ever since I got it. Memory hogging isn't a big concern of mine as I have a gaming rig, and thus plenty of performance.
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hmmm
i think it's atrocious that people believe that if they stick to "safe" sites that they will never have any problems!! HELLO - don't you know that sites can get hacked??!!! all it takes is one trojan embedded in the favicon of a site to compromise your system and you won't even know it. hmmm.... you don't have any A/V or A/M and you say you've never had a problem....... coincidence?? unless they want to destroy your system, they DON'T WANT YOU TO KNOW! [/ranting_at_the_retards]I fix computers on the side and been doing it for many years. I am not a
novice computer user so please!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
all the systems i have fixed had good AV installed so ....
If you read my post carefully i have mentioned that i do protect my system
with couple of softwares like NOScript on firefox and Process guard only to mention a few. I have couple of other softwares on there but not an AV.
I don't reply on safe sites only.
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If you are really looking for something that will drastically reduce the workload on the servers even better then avast try Avira or Eset smart security 4. Extremely small footprints and rated the top two out of all in performance and reliability and detection. You will never even know that they are running.
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Symantec, in my experience, has always failed as an Antivirus. Everytime I have ever used it I have received loads of false positives. Not to mention, it is a major resource hog. Since I was told about Avast professional 3 years ago, I have refused to look back.
I did an internal company review of Avast and convinced my enterprise level company to switch from McAfee to Avast as well. The switch reduced server workload and helped my IT department to increase productivity, and focus on other problems rather than chasing down user downloaded viruses and running daily spyware tests.
If you are really looking for something that will drastically reduce the workload on the servers even better then avast try Avira or Eset smart security 4. Extremely small footprints and rated the top two out of all in performance and reliability and detection. You will never even know that they are running.
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What about Bitdefender....? Its not even tested? Why? Its one of the higher rather AVs...
Says who?
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I use AVG, Ad-Aware, Spyboy Search & Destroy and ZoneAlarm, and this combination has worked fine for me ever since I got it. Memory hogging isn't a big concern of mine as I have a gaming rig, and thus plenty of performance.
Well if you have a gaming rig ESET Smart Security 4 is the way to go as it was specifically designed for gamers with an extremely small footprint that wont tie up your resources and will do a better job then all of those together. Check it out www.ESET.com
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Some of the companies with a pass mark can be had in a free version. Not bad at all. The copies of Sophos that my company owns offers free home versions to employees. This can be a good deal. My ISP offers McAfee for free as well. I think that the days of paid for home anti-virus are numbered.
As i always say and will stand by it always....You get what you pay for and if you want to be cheap and go with free product just remember that nothing in this world is free. You will pay for it some how some way some day. The free versions are nothing but watered down versions of the pay for versions. Your not getting the full package or total protection. Think about it.
I have been a tech for about 10 years now and the systems i see the most that have issues with malicious software on them are ones running free AV. Not the ones who pay for and maintain there subscriptions.
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Really? A virus in a 16x16 image???
Anways, avast rules, and its free.
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Now I have to disagree. I've been around for a bit myself and have worked on just as many that had paid AV as free. It's partially about the user too. If the user can't understand how to use an AV, then it doesn't matter if it's paid for or not. No AV is perfect. And just because you shell out good money doesn't mean you're getting a good program.
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Guest said:
I have been computing since 1997 and never had an AV installed on my system. Never had a issue as well. I almost never download softwares from unknown sites/users.
Not saying my system is not protected, i use firefox with noscript and also run a freeware ProcessGuard to control all the processes running on my system.
AV softwares are memory hogging and too intrusive. IMO these AV companies themselves make/spread viruses and threats to keep their business on the roll. I just dont trust them.
Waqas
I couldn't agree more. I don't even use anti-spyware programs. And I never...wait, my computers Croatian masters need to use it so I have to go now.
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hmm
I couldn't agree more. I don't even use anti-spyware programs. And I never...wait, my computers Croatian masters need to use it so I have to go now.You are maybe thinking i am just a noob and don't know what iam talking about...
Well whatever floats your boat. I shared my experince that's it. I am not here to
convience any one to follow my foot steps. For novice users maybe it is better to stick with AV and think that everything will be just fine.
Best of luck.
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