Digital Defender

Have to say, when I started out testing tonight, I didn't expect much from this product. It certainly doesn't look like much and overall, the GUI is meh...even when it detects something, it's pretty ugly, but wow, was I impressed. I threw more than 50 links at this thing (zero to one day malware) and it caught everything...everything.

Might be worth a try if there is anyone looking for a free alternative out there:

http://www.digital-defender.com/

 

I'll test it against 30 threats and we'll see how it goes. I'll be back in a jiffy with results.

EDIT: First off, this AV gets detected by my resident scanner. However, I am using ShadowDefender for this so no worries installing even it its malware as I can just revert back.

EDIT 2: The program asks me to uninstall any other anti-malware software I might have on the computer and won't let me install Digital Defender until I've done that. I'm tossing the Digital Defender installation to the recycle bin. A true anti-malware wouldn't do this. I definately think something is wrong here. Don't trust Digital Defender.

EDIT 3: Did a scan with Hitman Pro. It detects the file as 'suspicious' and is uploaded to the cloud. Of course, in the cloud the file is detected by Prevx. So, according to Hitman's behavioural analysis the file is a rootkit and this is verified with Prevx. Also, Digital Defender provides a speed-up-the-computer-tool. This is detected by one vendor at VT as adware. URLVoid reports the site as clean though.

My advice: Be careful using this application.

TheIgste, I highly recommend you rollback to a previous state where you didn't have it installed!

 

Isn't DigitalDefender the av using the VirusBuster engine?

 

Really? Most AVs look for other anti-malware and tell you to uninstall them. Open a Kaspersky .msi file with Orca and take a look at the list of security apps it checks for, it's pretty long.

Of course. Prevx also detected a .Net framework file digitally signed by Microsoft on my system along with a slew of other harmless files. Most of these were 0/43 at Virus Total or 1/43 (Prevx of course). Prevx also automatically detects anything written with AutoHotkey as malware, which is ridiculous. The Fanbois will be outraged, but Prevx is a FP machine. I mistakenly bought a licence for it and uninstalled it after two weeks because it drove me nuts with FPs.

Back to Digital Defender, it gets tested by Virus Bulletin, see here. Virus Bulletin in not in the habit of testing rogue AVs. It is also a download at Softpedia. In my experience Softpedia is pretty dependable.

Let me guess, Prevx? Or McAfee Artemis? 1/43 is hardly conclusive.

My advice: Don't blindly believe everything Prevx tells you.

 

Yes, VirusBuster engine. Looks like Preventon's twin sister.

 

As mentioned there's nothing wrong with this antivirus,not a rogue by far.

 

If it works well, no harm in seeing another freebie do well. Hopefully it doesn't weigh like the titanic.

 

No, please have a look again. It's not detected as adware by Prevx or McAfee Artemis. I just find it odd that their products are detected as suspicious. More often than not, legit software isn't detected at all.

Agreed. Prevx can produce some false positives, which is why I did another test. I did a scan with Hitman to see if the installation file was suspicious, which it indeed was (neglecting the fact that Prevx detected it as malware). I'm not saying its' a rouge. I'm just saying it's suspicious and I would be cautious having Digital Defender installed. If it's indeed legit and as good as the author of the thread says it is, I'll definately test the software against a set of malware samples!

 

OK, I downloaded this Fullspeed PC and then uploaded it to Virus Total. It had already been checked today and was 0/43. I had it re-analyzed and it's still 0/43. What's the problem?

Prevx doesn't produce some FPs, it produces a lot. You said you scanned it with Hitman Pro and the Prevx part detected it. I take it that the other engines didn't and given the Prevx track record with FPs, I find this detection more suspicious than the file being scanned. Do you really think that Virus Bulletin would include it in their tests if it wasn't legitimate?

 

According to VirusTotal, the DDAV free version installer and FullSpeedPC reveals nothing (0/43)

With HitmanPro, Prevx reports DDAV as High Risk Cloaked malware, and no alerts from FullSpeedPC.


According to http://www.virusbtn.com,
VB100 Results Overview - December 2010 - DigitalDefender Antivirus. It fail on Windows 7 (You have to login to read the details)

 

The definitions on HMP's servers are probably not yet up to date, as Prevx itself doesn't detect this file. This happens more often(FP's from Prevx in Hitman Pro while Prevx itself already fixed the detection.)

 

Digital Defender

See here
https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=261551

http://www.raymond.cc/forum/spyware-viruses/18331-preventon-antivirus-and-digital-defender.html

http://billmullins.wordpress.com/20...-defender-pound-malware-before-it-pounds-you/

This detects well owing to Virusbuster engine. But In my experience the engine is not optimized in digital defender and needs to be improved.

 

No, Johnny. When I first posted I wasn't aware that Digital Defender took part in the VB100. My point wasn't that Prevx detected it as malware in Hitmans' cloud. It was that Hitman detected the file as suspicious itself. It hasn't anything to do with Prevx. Also, according to WOT (http://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/digital-defender.com) the site had been reported by some users as bad. That's one of the few reasons why I raised my eyebrows.

Depending on settings, Prevx will cause more or less false positives. In this case, based on what several users reports and that DD takes part in VB100, I am now convinced the software is legit and that it's indeed a false positive on Prevx' part (I've of course reported it to them). I will commence testing tonight and get back with the results!

Cheers!

 

I've ran Prevx for almost a year and have probably had a half dozen false positives, at the most. And I download a lot. My settings in Prevx are not maxed out though. The FP's that I have had have been corrected by Prevx the day I reported them. Prevx readings on VT will sometimes be different from the cloud readings as well. Since a good portion of the behavior analysis is done in the cloud, Prevx on VT is somewhat handicapped.

 

Wow, this thread went interesting...

DD worked very well on my system. It detected everything and I had no problems running it nor did I feel any drag on the system at all. It ran light and the RAM usage was actually lower than ESET.

It's an AV product. It doesn't surprise me that it wants you to uninstall any other AV products. As mentioned, most do. This is not a malware scanner...it's an AV product.

From what I saw, I would have no problems suggesting using DD to friends. I will say though, it would be nice if they would work on the GUI because it's pretty ugly. Especially the virus prompt when it stops something. Other than that, it works very well indeed.

 

Seeing the reports in this thread saying it's not some rouge AV, I'll definately test it against 500+ malware samples in the next few days! I'm glad you brought this product up. I hadn't heard of it before.

 

Yeah, I was quite impressed with it. Just wish they would do something about the GUI and perhaps make it a little more configurable.

 

I like simple GUIs in general! I'll try it on my VM on tuesday evening and get back with results. I will test Digital Defender against 500 malware sample collected in the last month. I'll perform an on-execution test as I think this gives the best indicator of how it performs protection-wise. It'll take a few hours to perform of course.

 

Yeah, I did my testing with 50 current (zero day and 1 day malware links). Like I said, it stopped everything and nothing was present on the system or in memory. I didn't even have to do a scan with it. I scanned the system with Hitman Pro and MBAM and they found nothing.

 

hey,

I thought id give ddefender a try and tried to install it with clamav for windows already installed. DDefender refused to install unless I uninstalled clamav.

I read the posts above about this, but figured since it was clamav it should install fine. I didnt have any problems installing avast or avira with clamAV present.

Ill pass on Ddefender

Saty

 

That's fair enough and your decision, but I really understand why an AV product doesn't want another AV product installed. Really, two resident AV products don't make much sense at all anyway.

 

They actually provide an installer without the AV check. It's a bit buried, obviously not intended for misuse.

http://digitaldefender.zendesk.com/home

I'd say it makes no sense.

 

Thanks for sharing!

 

You have to test an AV product for at least a week to see how it performs while copying and pasting files, burning dvds, downloading large files, working with intensive programs, and so on.

Although the detection may be good, hopefully the program's stability is as equally as good.

 

Agreed. But I'm going to listen to the author's observations and trust him that the software is lightweight. I'm just going to test its effiency against malware threats. I simply don't have the time to post results and impressions of a week's worth of time. I'll let the proffessional testers do that!