None for me too. I believe the future of AV is that it will always be around, however it will take a much less of a role in securing PC's. At the moment with increasing dependency on the cloud internet and the like, with the rise of sophisticated malware i feel AV's will always fall short. This is why i believe many AV vendors incorporate counter measures to back their AV's. Applications like EMET, HitmanPro Alert, MBAE, Appguard, ERP virtualisation will take an increased role. Hence many Wilders members have come to this realization by looking at the results thus far, as well as previous polls. regards.
How do you guys know if you're infected if you don't have an antivirus? Some viruses do cause system break down which in those cases, is very easy to guess you might be infected. But some remain silent in your computer with you not noticing. While having on-demand scanners like malwarebytes is good and recommendable, once some viruses infect you then it is too late. For example ransomware, even you managed to get rid of it with your on-demand scanner your files would probably still be encrypted.
I usually notice there is something suspicious going on. I've been removing viruses for 24 years and have learnt a lot in this time. But, in all honesty I find it very hard to get infected.
Nothing realtime/ondemand on mine PC, Qihoo 360 on mom's, just to be sure, she likes to click on everything. But excluding Qihoo 360, the best ranking AV for months, is odd, I am sure many people started using it. Indeed, I tried to do it intentionally a few times for testing purposes and I failed. I always wonder, how people can get infected so easily, like by visiting a webpage.
Most of malware has to be executed to infect your system. Controlling what can and can't be executed will prevent most infections. On-demand scanners can be used to confirm that your system is clean (I use them as second opinion). As mentioned by others, it's not that easy to get infected if you practise safe computing.
In addition to what Simplicity mentioned, there's also system integrity checks. On mine for example, an integrity check runs at startup that checks the contents of the Root, Windows, and System folders. It will report any additions to them and alert if any of the contents have been altered. I have another on-demand integrity check that will check the contents of the entire drive against a database of its contents. If I feel that I need to, I can also run an integrity scan at shutdown that is even more comprehensive. Most malware will store some data in the registry, often autostart entries. My registry is replaced with a clean, optimized copy at startup. If malware managed to run and store something there, that data will be lost when I reboot.
Can you please post, how do you do a system integrity check? I shutdown with CCleaner to clean temp/browsercache and I delete registry/HDD startup entries.
It can start by doing a Google search and click on the first link that meets your requirements (company's pay to be listed on Google. the more you pay the higher the listing) just because your link is posted first doesn't guarantee it is not infected.
Azure, I stopped using real times antiviruses 4 years ago and drop carrying on demand scanners 3 years back. Doing things like that is OK if your computers are not shared (not even with your wife) and if you pretty much keep the computers static. I mean, not changing programs. I know this is not going to make sense to you but I feel safer by not using a real time AV than if I did. If that wasn't so, I would be using an AV. Just about anything that I do in the computer, I do it under Sandboxie. It doesn't matter the program or the file, if its going to run in my computer, they run sandboxed. And the way I see it, I want Sandboxie to be at its best. No conflict or chance of a conflict is what I expect to achieve when I have no other security program running in my computers. When I stopped using AV, I wasn't planning to do so, never pondered about it but one day it just happened. I got fed up with nice antiviruses being changed for no reason and one day after the AV that I was using at the time got an upgrade that I didn't like, I took it down and never look for a replacement. I was ready and it felt like nothing. But I kept on demand scanners for one more year. As I became more and more a Sandboxie user, I found myself running on demand scans less and less so most of the time when I ran an on demand scan, I found that a new version of the scanner had been released and had to upgrade the scanner. So I found a better way of doing things for my case use. Now, sometimes when I am doing something in Shadow mode (Shadow defender), I might install HMP and Malwarebytes and run scans. And every once in a while I might run something else like TDSS Killer or Emsisoft. Needless to say but I ll say it, they never find anything. Not even a cookie. Bo
I use several utilities that check the contents of a directory and create a hash for each file. These are stored in a database. When run again, it compares the file lists and hashes to the database to determine if anything has changed. Most of the utilities I'm using are older and probably won't run properly on the newer operating systems. Sentinel by Runtimeware is one of them. NISFilecheck is a good on-demand checker. MoniDir 2000 can check directory contents but doesn't check individual files. For XP and older systems, Filechecker, listed under Brightfort retired apps on this forum is another polling integrity checker. I'm sure there's newer integrity checkers around. I haven't looked into them.
That is exactly what happened to me many years back. I was running Norton back then, NIS specifically, doing a search on what should have been a safe subject. Clicked the top link. Started getting popups by the hundreds. NIS had a popup blocker but it was completely overwhelmed and crashed, first the firewall/security suite component, then the AV. Shortly afterwards, Windows crashed. When I got it restarted, Norton detected a virus but couldn't remove it. It wasn't long afterwards that I started looking into other options for securing a PC.
Same thing happened to me! I was too using Norton, I also did a google search, went on a website that simply redirected me to China and infected while NIS did nothing! I since then mostly evaluated antivirus software based on how well it implements web blocking/URL blocking as opposed to anything else. I stayed with Avira and FortiClient for awhile as those had top notch web blockers and in family computers also supplemented it with malwarebytes pro. After that I moved onto Linux, especially on personal computer. Now I am back and just purchased Webroot mostly for it being light weight but I have also changed the way I use Windows for Internet browsing - which I simply do less of on Windows! 90% of my Internet browsing is done on Linux where drive by infections are unlikely to occur and the other 10-5% on Windows. Now Im getting a new laptop I am looking into a dual boot set up. I really do feel like Linux can really fill in the niche market of safe browsing and super light weight operating system on people's PCs while Windows is the compatibility operating system. Since mostly everything is done on the Internet, it makes sense to boot first into Linux and on those rare occasions where online office doesn't work well enough or I need Netflix/Amazon or some kind of gaming that happens not to be on Steam. Anyways... long post. Short story, Linux became the ultimate security solution for me when it comes to viruses/malware and PUPs.
I agree, AVs are not necessary let alone essential if the computer is not shared, and the user applies some common sense when using the Internet (no opening unknown e-mail attachments, no executables etc…). In my household I have 3 XP computers with no AV, protected by Sandboxie and Shadow Defender used by my wife (dangerous user) and sometimes by my son who looks at notebooks more as some kind of dinosaur technology from the 20th century. These machines have been clean for years now, I only make sure of avoiding any financial transactions on these computers. With my 2 work notebooks (Vista and Win eight) it is a different story. To begin with I have 2GB of RAM with Vista (32 bit) and 8GB of RAM with Win 8 (64 bit) meaning that the presence of an AV is practically unnoticeable (you know there is one because of the icon on the tray which could be even hidden). Now my AV on these machines is not a first line of defense, as this role is still covered by Sandboxie/Shadow Defender. Therefore why do I run an AV at all? Time is very important in some situations and a good AV nowadays with its cloud extension is probably the quickest way to check a suspicious download, but more importantly third party USB flash drives which are still the most infected vectors (in my work environment I plug in large numbers at times). The bottom line is that one should decide whether one’s Internet environment requires an AV, in some situations it is unnecessary in others it is a good quick tool to detect malware. Noone particular mentioned integrity checks which is one way to make sure nothing has been tampered by malware. On the other hand restoring a clean system image, is another quick way to respond to a suspected intrusion.
Oh... oh, okay. Dammit I'm late to the party! Anyway... Realtime = None On-demand = None Online analysis = None Boot disc = None Hell in fact, I also disabled browser malware and phishing protection. I was about to do that, actually. That way we can know for certain who is completely not using an AV in any type, such as me and Okami for example.
Agree. People using AVs on demand, are still using AV technology. The only way I see to skip AV technology completely is to restore a known clean image as often as possible or to accept one's own judgement based on behavioural patterns of the OS, which is also okay as I still believe infections are rare and most likely caused by users distraction.
Aren't AV polls about the use of real-time AVs? I don't see a need to separate "None" from "On-demand". Among those who don't use 1 realtime, they are bound to use AV tech in 1 form or another, sometimes indirectly such as by downloading from sources such as Softpedia where the host has already scanned the programs prior to hosting the files. Not to mention the use of VirusTotal and the likes ...
I think the line should be drawn at whether the user has the AV software installed on their device. IMO, an internet shortcut to Jotti or VT wouldn't qualify as being installed. I get some use from both but not enough to justify installing that mess. I removed the last resident AV around 2005 or 2006 after experimenting with multiple AVs. About 2 years later, I stopped using installed manual scanners and eventually removed them. On this PC, I've never installed either one. I'd consider keeping a manual scanner on board if they didn't insist on installing services and multiple resident processes. There's no good reason that a manual scanner should have to run all of the time. Even if they were better, I'd choose not to install one just because of the feature creep in them. I don't need one searching through and uploading my files whenever it chooses.
Damn. I got MBAM and Hitman pro on demand on a USB stick and I voted None. Does that mean I am disqualified and have to serve time in the penalty box now?
The penalties for too many men in the field are loss of down and five yards from the previous spot. Thats what you should get. Bo
