Editor's Choice For Best Paid Antivirus Program

1. Bitdefender Total Security 2013

Not only does this antivirus program has the best protection when it came to testing, but it has a very clean interface during my testing. The program is very smooth, but it does have some missing components that they should add including a major update over the My Bitdefender. However, this program is very clean and makes it so simple that anyone can use it.

2. Kaspersky Pure 3.0 Total Security

Kaspersky has never failed to disappoint use when it comes to protection. The program has every tool that the average user would need, and it is one of the highest rated antivirus programs on the market. Coming out of the gate Kaspersky can be strange to use however once you get used to it you wont want to get rid of it.

3. Norton 360 

While many people shake their heads when it comes to the idea of using a Norton product, there is no real reason to fear this program. While Norton does have issues with uninstalling which forces people to search in the registry and wipe the Norton files for good, the fact remains that it has really high testing scores. Norton has never disappointed me when it came to its scores, but it lacks the ability to easily remove the program.

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Editors Choice For Best Free Antivirus Software

We will give you our top 3 free antivirus software for the month of May.

1. Bitdefender Free Antivirus

When this software was first released I was a little skeptical over the protection offered by the software. However after recent changes they have made coupled with their amazing scores on the Av-Test Bitdefender was able to take the Gold for the best free antivirus software.

2. Avast Free Antivirus 8

Avast was the king of free antivirus protection however it has lost that title in recent times. However, the king might rise again because they keep adding features that make the product hard to beat. The program lacks in protection which is why that it gets the second spot. Maybe this will change for the next month, but who knows.

3. Ad Aware Free Antivirus+

Then finally we have Ad Aware Free Antivirus+ which has done well on the testing and has constant support from the developers. The program offers the best Antispyware of any program that I have seen, and that is coupled with two separate antivirus engines which have both done well. Those two engines happen to be their own engine, and the Vipre engine which is a high scoring antivirus software.

Notes

Please keep in mind that just because a program was not listed on the choices does not make it bad. I look for features, and protection scoring. These three have done well consistently, and I think that they are worth of getting my editors choice. This list can change and will change next month so congratulations to these companies.

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Bitdefender Free Antivirus Review

Above is the full video review were I give you the breakdown and the looks of the program.

Protection

When it comes to protection ratings Bitdefender is the best according to Av-test.org who has given Bitdefender a 100% rating two times in a row. This protection rating is truly amazing which is why I recommend this or Kaspersky when paying. However, Bitdefender has said lets try to branch out by offering a free program. Now this program does offer you all the essential protection that you need to survive the internet. This coupled with the Bitdefender Traffic light makes your computer an unstoppable force. The program is able to stay light but protect you by doing it in a very new way. Most antivirus products scan pages and running files. However if the file does not run then you could still be infected, and they do not do a proactive scan while Bitdefender says lets take that system and add one new idea. This program scans all download programs and files. This is meant to offer a more secure level of protection, while other products scan for behaviour Bitdefender says let me do the hard work and you just relax, but hey relaxing is easy when you have the best Antivirus product on the market (according to test results).

Features

This program while light has a strange way of showing its features which puts a lot of people off. However, I don't mind because I can see what it is that they are scanning and monitoring.  It

• Full protection. This program gives you all of the necessary shields for free.
• Idle Scanning- While you don't do anything Bitdefender takes the time to scan your computer for malware by scanning important sectors and then it breaks down to more common files.
• My Bitdefender Login- This service will allow your account to monitor what services you have connected. This is also a great place to setup your facebook and twitter protection.
• New Quarantine Menu- Bitdefender released a patch that now moves items to Quarantine rather than deleting them on the spot. 
• On Demand Scanner- You have the ability to right click on any file/folder/disk and Bitdefender will scan the selected items. Most antivirus programs have this ability with the exception of a few (Windows Defender), but it is still nice to have this feature since there is no pre built scans in Bitdefender Free.

Settings

If you are a power user then this is not the product that you are looking for. However why pass up better protection for tools that you will never use? The fact is that there are no settings in this product from the time you install it until you remove it there are not settings. However, when a program that is made around an Auto-Pilot idea what would you expect. Now while this is a slight annoyance it is respectable because it makes our lives easier and power users/ data hogs are not a large group so naturally they are not the target market.

Recommendation ( To Possible Users)

You should use this program if you are using an old computer and need a way to protect it. This program is great because it is consuming about 9mb worth of RAM which is really light as far as antivirus programs go. If you are not concerned with memory usage, but rather the ability to set it up and go then this is definitely the program for you. You might just want a great antivirus program for free and why not choose the best (according to testing). 

Test Results

From the last 3 tests provided by Av-test.org Bitdefender Scored a perfect score. To put this in perspective Microsoft Security Essentials has failed 3 times in a row, so why settle for a heavier program with less protection?

http://www.av-test.org/en/tests/home-user/windows-xp/marapr-2013/

Download Bitdefender Free Here: http://www.bitdefender.com/solutions/free.html

Changes (Towards To Company)

- Give us more information from My Bitdefender. Give us logs, detections, websites blocked, something that will give us information about the security of our computer and web surfing habits.

- Allow a custom website block in Bitdefender (All Versions). The reason I say this is because Bitdefender can't give us 100% security and I have a couple of my old block lists sitting around that I can add. This will also work well with parental blocking.

- Allow a setting for Bitdefender to scan with certain parameters, the traditional scan types (Quick, Full, Smart).

Question

What are your thoughts about Bitdefender's Free Antivirus? 

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Trojan.Zbot!gen44

This malware since our last update has had 3 different variations with a few changes and still has a low threat rate. However let us jump into this malware and see what the major changes were, and what they could mean for you. Now please keep in mind that this family is known as the Zeus Bot which was a big threat "back in the day".



Effects
This malware was designed to specifically go after important bank information and goes through a number of ways to get it. The trojan will even try to go through your saved files and passwords on internet explorer to retrieve important passwords.  While this malware is hard to deal with if you don't have Antivirus it is actually a very low level threat as far as malware goes. While the malware may pose a threat to infected computers there are not a lot of infections. According to Symantec there could be as few as 1,000 (at the time of this post) worth of infected computers. Now if you believe you are one of these few then be careful and try to remove the malware as fast as possible. This malware is controlled by the creator or a bot program and it can be commanded to:  shutdown the computer, reboot the computer, delete files, and delete important system files which requires you to reinstall the operating system. However, you need to keep in mind that these threats are not as bad as other malware because you still have full access to your computer and you remove the malware with a simple secondary scanner that are in the lists below.

Detection

While this malware is not the easiest to detect, there are some obvious signs. The first one being strange or unscheduled shutdowns/restarts. This is generally the sign of malware or some sort of malware issue. You might also (hopefully not) get a warning from one of your accounts, whether it is Google, Paypal or anything else please read these if you know they are from the real company. Your computer will also start to slowdown from the malware which is typical. 

Please Follow My Removal and Protection Guide

Removal 
You can remove the malware by using the secondary scanners below, and they will detect the malware. However,you need to realize that if one of them says that your computer is safe there is still a chance that the computer is infected with some sort of malware. So make sure to use two or three of the scanners below. I recommend that you use Malwarebytes and HitmanPro because they are the most powerful secondary scanners on the market. With this malware we also recommend that you change any and all passwords that could have been compromised from this attack, because if you don't the person that sent you the malware might be able to access your accounts and change the log in information.

Protection
If you want to protect against the malware you will want an up to date antivirus and firewall. I recommend that you use Ad Aware Antivirus or Avast Free Antivirus because these two have always found malware that someone else has missed. But make sure that you only use one of the above antivirus products because we want to avoid confliction between them. For your firewall I recommend that you use Comodo free firewall which offers the best HIPS protection in the industry, and it contains a ton of extra features like the Sandbox and the Comodo Kiosk.


Secondary Malware Scanners
 HitmanPro: http://www.surfright.nl/en/hitmanpro/
Active Scan: http://www.pandasecurity.com/homeusers/solutions/activescan/
Malwarebytes: http://www.malwarebytes.org/
Super AntiSpyware: http://www.superantispyware.com/
Bitdefender Quick Scan: http://quickscan.bitdefender.com/
Norton Power Eraser: http://security.symantec.com/nbrt/npe.aspx

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Infostealer!gen4

This malware was first identified by Symantec, and this is the signature for a family fo Trojans which as you can guess from the name is meant to steal passwords and user information. This malware is actually not very common, and it is actually a low threat, but the malware does have some unique characteristics that make it difficult for an antivirus product to detect it. Now since the malware is such a low threat there is a good chance that your antivirus product already has the signatures in its database or heuristics engine never the less lets jump in.





Effects
This malware will get onto your computer and try to use an encryption method from the program/file, and it tries to slip by the antivirus program that you are using. It will then try to get private information from your browsers saved passwords form, and it will try to gather information from email clients that might be on the computer. This malware is also hard to detect because of the encryption method that it is using but with all malware there is a sign that your computer might be infected.

Detection
If you believe that your computer is infected with this malware then there are some hints that you can use to try and diagnose the computer. The first thing is that your computer will be slower, and this is generally associated with all malware so you can tell that something is wrong with your computer. You might also notice account warnings from Google or another company warning about someone attempting an unauthorized access to your account. There is a chance you can't access your email client or other online accounts.

Removal
You can remove the malware by using the secondary scanners below, and they will detect the malware. However you need to realize that if one of them says that your computer is safe there is still a chance that the computer is infected with some sort of malware. So make sure to use two or three of the scanners below. I recommend that you use Malwarebytes and HitmanPro because they are the most powerful secondary scanners on the market. With this malware we also recommend that you change any and all passwords that could have been compromised from this attack, because if you don't the person that sent you the malware might be able to access your accounts and change the log in information.

Protection
If you want to protect against the malware you will want an up to date antivirus and firewall. I recommend that you use Ad Aware Antivirus or Avast Free Antivirus because these two have always found malware that someone else has missed. But make sure that you only use one of the above antivirus products because we want to avoid confliction between them. For your firewall I recommend that you use Comodo free firewall which offers the best HIPS protection in the industry, and it contains a ton of extra features like the Sandbox and the Comodo Kiosk.

Secondary Malware Scanners 
HitmanPro: http://www.surfright.nl/en/hitmanpro/
Panda Active Scan: http://www.pandasecurity.com/homeusers/solutions/activescan/
Malwarebytes: http://www.malwarebytes.org/
Super AntiSpyware: http://www.superantispyware.com/
Bitdefender Quick Scan: http://quickscan.bitdefender.com/
Norton Power Eraser: http://security.symantec.com/nbrt/npe.aspx

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Skype Might Not Be That Private

Microsoft might be scanning all of your Skype messages for malware and spam. This is nothing new however we don't quiet know the extent of the information being gathered however Microsoft stands by that they are doing it for the security of the users, but can we be sure? Microsoft attacked Google over privacy issues about scanning and reading emails and yet here they are doing it. Now while Google does it for targeted ads, malware, spam protection as of now I can say Microsoft is using it for malware and spam protection. None of these so does this pose as a security and privacy issue to us? Lets find out!



Privacy Issues
While we can't confirm what Microsoft is doing with those scanned messages we do know that they scan them for malware and spam, but were does this information go? Is Microsoft storing the information if not were does it go and what is the deletion process that it goes through? Microsoft might be under some heat from security and privacy advocates about this so called scanning. Now the issue that lies with this is the fact that Microsoft is in the process of ruining Google's reputation however they are now in just as much trouble, but they are better at hiding this because no one bothers to taunt them. So do you feel comfortable with them scanning all of your Skype messages I am because I don't care if they scan the messages so long as they don't READ them or have access to the messages sent.

Security Issues
Other than the normal security flaws that you get with any software this one has no real negatives and in theory is safer for you because they are scanning all of the messages. Now as i mentioned above there are a lot of privacy issues with this but since Microsoft would never release an official post or explanation over their process we are stuck and shrouded in mystery. Now there is still some major security issues with Skype and that is their password recovery system. For someone to get into your skype account all they need to know is your
1. Skype Name
2. Email Adress
3. Registered Email Address (same as 2)
4. When did you create your skype account This is by year
5. Country
6. Payment method
7. 3 contacts.

Now while to most of us this would be hard to crack it is actually fairly simple. I can get all of this from your account details. Except for Payment method and I can say free and get it right on most chances because most people don't pay for Skype credits. So that is still a major security hole for Skype and they need to fix this broken system.

Summary
So Microsoft needs to do a lot of work and explaining because if they are storing the messages then there are a lot of people who will question what for and they will want more information. Then we have to worry about the weak password recovery leads me to believe that Microsoft will make some major changes within the coming months towards the most popular VOIP service around.

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Trojan.Blackrev

This malware was first analyzed by Symantec go visit them why don't you?

This malware is was first discovered by the Symantec corporation, and they found this to be a low level threat I am going to disagree with that statement, and I will explain why.

What Does It Do?

This malware infects the computer by downloading some sort of rogue software, and it is meant to turn the computer into a zombie. They then use this new "zombie" computer to send out DDOS attacks to the websites of the creators choice. This malware once installed onto the computer will change its name so that it is not noticeable to you. The most common name is explorer.exe which would be the windows explorer name so you would not think anything of the program. Something that you must keep in mind is about how much has the program spread. Now the malware is very well contained, and there is not any large breakouts as of now so we are in the clear for now, but the only way to prevent the malware is for you to learn and protect your self from it.

Symptoms

Your computer will restart at random times for no apparent reason, this can be used as a way for the malware to through you off or to prevent you from uninstalling it. This is generally a clear cut sign that there is a form of malware on the computer or that your computer is facing hardware issues. You can also notice computer slowdown because all malware does tend a tool on your computer especially one that has been "zombified". You will also notice your computer acting strangely whether it is random applications opening or you are visiting random websites without actually doing anything. When this happens it means that the malware creator has already taken control of the computer.

Threat Level Medium

The reason that I classify this malware as a medium level threat is because of the goal and the use of the malware. Now while the malware is not common it is still a threat if you had the malware, and this is something that you don't want to have. Now it is not classified as High, Severe, or Critical is because it is easily stopped such as turning the computer off and using the AVG rescue CD to remove it. It is higher than a level of Low, or Very Low is because the malware does some serious damage and could do more if more people had the malware.

Removal

You can remove the malware by using the secondary scanners below, and they will detect the malware. However you need to realize that if one of them says that your computer is safe there is still a chance that the computer is infected with some sort of malware. So make sure to use two or three of the scanners below. I recommend that you use Malwarebytes and HitmanPro because they are the most powerful secondary scanners on the market. If you are having a hard time accessing the internet then you should use the AVG Rescue CD which can be found here.

Protection

If you want to protect against the malware you will want an up to date antivirus and firewall. I recommend that you use Ad Aware Antivirus or Avast Free Antivirus because these two have always found malware that someone else has missed. But make sure that you only use one of the above antivirus products because we want to avoid confliction between them. For your firewall I recommend that you use Comodo free firewall which offers the best HIPS protection in the industry, and it contains a ton of extra features like the Sandbox and the Comodo Kiosk.

Second Opinion Malware Scanners!

HitmanPro- http://www.surfright.nl/en/hitmanpro/

Panda Active Scan- http://www.pandasecurity.com/homeusers/solutions/activescan/

Malwarebytes- http://www.malwarebytes.org/

Super AntiSpyware- http://www.superantispyware.com/

Bitdefender Quick Scan- http://quickscan.bitdefender.com/

Norton Power Eraser- http://security.symantec.com/nbrt/npe.aspx

Kaspersky TDSSKiller- http://kaspersky-tdsskiller.en.softonic.com/

McAfee Stinger- http://www.mcafee.com/us/downloads/free-tools/stinger.aspx

Trend Micro House Call- http://housecall.trendmicro.com/

Eset Onlne Scanner- http://www.eset.com/us/online-scanner/

Dr.Web CureIt! - http://www.freedrweb.com/cureit/

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