Windows 8 to have built-in anti-virus - there's good and bad news

I think Windows has taken security seriously for a while. The problem is that they were an industry leader and the main target so it's been a learning process. If OSX was to start caring about security it would be much easier for them... they only have to look at the mistakes and best practices that Windows has defined over the years.

 

You're right, sorry. It's easy to forget sometimes that 7 is basically the polished up child of Vista.

@M00n/Hungry: It does have some to do with the years of scrutiny and the advancement of creating/breaking security, yes. However, there can, looking back, not be many excuses afforded to them. After all guys, Windows was designed to be ran as Admin for so many years, and that was before the coming of UAC and other measures.

I also think trying to "own the web" as it were contributed to this as well. Make no mistake, MS very much wanted an Active X world, it wanted it's own technologies to take over. MS made another mistake with IE being so dug into Windows for so long. If you could bust open the browser, you likely knocked a hole wide open into the OS too. Between bad design and wanting to take everything over by making certain that websites coded for IE only or mostly, among other issues, MS most certainly made the bed they've laid in for so long.

They're changing it, which is fantastic that they finally have gotten the message. But they most certainly are the cause of their own problems.

 

And I don't disagree with you. My only point is that Microsoft does have a "one up" on the other antivirus developers because they can view their source code.

 

You're certainly right about that. The best way to know how to secure the code is to look at it. It certainly has worked in the world of Linux. It's just a shame that MS concentrated more on being the Alexander the Great of the software world and neglected security for so long.

 

Yes, it certainly is.

 

I was thinking this myself from the start of this thread and you are the only one that mentioned it up to this point in my reading.

 

As with the defender in Win7 it will be disabled when another AV installs.

 

Where did I say this? It's much more complicated than that anyway.

I'd much rather discuss what was actually said than this strawman argument.

I objected to the statement you made that a browser was an unimportant thing to get worried about. You'd have to be blind to think that a browser is an inconsequential thing in the internet age; there's a reason why the big companies are fighting over these things.

You are asking "how is something orange, other than when it's orange?" How am I supposed to answer that?

If it wasn't for the "anti-trust BS" as you put it, do you think Microsoft would allow Windows users to disable Windows Defender?

For the record, I personally don't think it's wrong to simply supply generic software with one's own OS - but I do think it's wrong to use a monopoly position to force software on people and to unfairly reduce competition.

Remember how Microsoft lied in court and claimed that Windows wouldn't run without IE? This was proven in court to be a false claim; there was no technical reason to force IE onto people, and Windows certainly ran fine without it (98Lite anyone?). Microsoft was using the monopoly of the OS to reduce the ability of others to compete. Now people have the choice to disable IE and other unwanted programs supplied with the OS.

 

e.g.
“We need to make sure Windows 3.1 only runs on top of MS DOS.”
- David Cole, Microsoft Senior Vice-President


“The approach we will take is to detect DR DOS 6 and refuse to load. The error message should be something like ‘Invalid device driver interface.’”
- Phillip Barrett, Microsoft Windows Development Manager


Microsoft have an entrenched mindset that has been there since the beginning. It is no doubt the kind of mindset it takes to be successful.

These days it would be difficult for Microsoft to use such an obvious method to sabotage the products of competing antivirus vendors and get away with it.


http://www.theregister.co.uk/1999/11/05/how_ms_played_the_incompatibility/

http://www.ecis.eu/documents/Finalversion_Consumerchoicepaper.pdf (interesting paper, mentions many of Microsoft anti-competitive practices over their history; may be biased given it's an organisation promoting open source software writing the report)

 

IMO i've never felt MS forcing IE, it just comes pre installed with it's software and you can install a different one whenever you want

 

Uninstalling it is another story.

 

I guess you weren't using computers around the Win98 period.

The other thing about when you installed Windows 98 without IE, Netscape actually ran noticeably smoother. I know others found the same thing at the time as well.

 

can't see why this is made into any kind of issue:-windows has shipped with a built in firewall for years and later versions with a built in anti-malware(they don't seem to claim it is an AV?):-neither of these has stopped users replacing them with other products of their choice

 

it is or will be optional on later versions in europe,but try using microsoft update without it,you can download updates and install manually using other browsers but having IE makes it far easier

http://www.pcworld.com/article/1665..._7_in_europe_without_browser.html?tk=rel_news

 

And the malware writers will just yawn at this... So they have to bypass MSE by default, they are already doing that by now. For them, nothing is really changing.

This will only speed up the malware evolution. The malware writers that can't adapt to bypass MSE will die out, the others will be even more difficult to fight, for everyone. Of course, Comodo will save us!

 

The fact that a vendor know his own code is an advantage only in exceptional cases.

Most of threats are not targeting vulnerabilities in the code.

 

As they have to bypass the Operating system security by default, I fail to see your point, the objective of a security software is mostly prevention, a virus is a virus, and a conscious user will not be infected even without ant-virus Mr expert.

MS does open part of their source code to vendors, especially those considered "gold"MS partners, hell they even gave all Windows source code to China otherwise they would be forbidden to set a foot there.

 

I didn't much like the built-in firewall in Win XP, but on Windows 7 it's actually pretty good (especially when used with Windows Firewall Control), and it's lighter than any 3rd party firewall I've tried. If Windows 8 built-in AV is equivalent (basic and light on resources) then great.

 

Both Windows Firewall, it will be the first service that I'll disable after OS installation.

 

before even seeing what they are like?why?for all you know so far it may be best AV available by then

 

just to make sure, with "code" you mean APIs and SDKs which serves as intermediary between applications and the OS?

 

The Microsoft previous are not encouraging. For security, third part softwares are most powerful.

 

Believe it or not, 3rd party AV/IS fanboys do exist. It's crazy.

 

I like it. People can use their own if they want to. For people like me who do without a real-time AV, since this one is integrated and will therefore be light as a feather, I might just keep the thing on.

 

I wonder how much remnants are left in those European OS. I just use windows updates from the control panel, which is automatic and manual.