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Definitive Best *Free* Antivirus 2015

Asked by nabz0r,

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Poll: Favorite *Free* Antivirus 2015  

360 members have voted

  1. 1. Your Choice?

    • 360 Total Security
      29
    • Ad-Aware
      0
    • Avast! Free
      39
    • AVG AntiVirus Free
      5
    • Avira Free
      20
    • Baidu Antivirus
      2
    • BitDefender (Free Edition)
      13
    • ClamWin/ClamAV
      1
    • Comodo Anti Virus/Internet Security
      5
    • Emsisoft Anti-Malware (free edition)
      0
    • Panda Cloud Antivirus
      10
    • Microsoft Security Essentials
      41
    • Other (please specify below)
      5
    • Malwarebytes (Free Edition)
      9

Question

Veteran

nabz0r Veteran

Posted
  • Veteran
Posted

It's a new year, and a new poll for Definitive Free Best Antivirus. The 2014 thread can be found here.

This is a poll for best Free antivirus, there is a separate thread for paid antiviruses here.

If your choice of Best Free Antivirus is not listed, please choose Other and specify in the comments.

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Grand Master

DeusProto

Posted
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I go by what the scientific results like AV-Comparatives say, and it gives 360 high marks.

 

ATM I'm torn between 360 Internet and 360 Total Security 6 beta though.

 

Also 360 detected 0day custom malware compiled with the Zeus engine: https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/6d3826b687033269b68c15e2f875bc3863203358c16f6b0018cb52097cd48c32/analysis/1395914178/

 

Note how Kaspersky and Eset didnt detect it...

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Grand Master

binaryzero

Posted
Posted

I personally don't have an "Proper AV" installed on my PC

 

Every once in a while I'll do the follow:

 

SuperAntiSpyware (Complete Scan)

CCleaner (look things over)

MalwareBytes (Also Complete Scan

ADW Clearner... (About every 90days or so)

 

Once scans are complete I take them off (don't like a lot of stuff on my pc...

 

You're crazy. 

 

Once you've worked in enterprise IT, you'll realise that it's probably a good idea to have AV installed. 

  • robertwnielsen, articuno1au and goretsky
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Grand Master

Knife Party

Posted
Posted

I go by what the scientific results like AV-Comparatives say, and it gives 360 high marks.

 

ATM I'm torn between 360 Internet and 360 Total Security 6 beta though.

 

Also 360 detected 0day custom malware compiled with the Zeus engine: https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/6d3826b687033269b68c15e2f875bc3863203358c16f6b0018cb52097cd48c32/analysis/1395914178/

 

Note how Kaspersky and Eset didnt detect it...

try 360 total security beta its, not bad

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ajua

Posted
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I've swtiched many relatives from MSE to 360 Total Security. It works really good and the detection rate with BitDefender and/or Avira engines are great. For someone looking to add a free Firewall to his setup, GlassWire is awesome and also free.

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Experienced

guitmz

Posted
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ESET is the one. I am a virus writter and they released a definition for my last creation within days of its release. And it was not a binary release so they had to compile it and test it etc, they were really fast. Oh, its a Linux virus to make it better. More info about it: www.virusradar.com/en/Linux_Zariche/detail

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Grand Master

+Warwagon MVC

Posted
  • MVC
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ESET is the one. I am a virus writter and they released a definition for my last creation within days of its release. And it was not a binary release so they had to compile it and test it etc, they were really fast. Oh, its a Linux virus to make it better. More info about it: www.virusradar.com/en/Linux_Zariche/detail

 

Virus writer huh?  ...What do you do with them?

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Experienced

guitmz

Posted
Posted

Virus writer huh?  ...What do you do with them?

 

Nothing, I release the source code at VX Heavens. I dont release the virus in binary form, it's just a hobby that I have, I find them fascinating (the way they look like real biological cels, polymorphism, etc)

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francescob

Posted
Posted

I voted for Panda, but only as a second av choice.

It must be # 2 because all the others say they are number 1. :D

MSE/Windows Defender is my # 1 choice.

 

 

Is there any website that measures the RAM usage and slowdowns of each antivirus? I'm tired of having to set up VMs to test that stuff myself every damn time (last time Avast was the fastest with decent detection and had the lowest RAM usage but I hate its UI and that dumb free subscription).

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Grand Master

torrentthief

Posted
Posted

I find it bizare that people aren't voting for Avira considering it always wins in antivirus tests as the best free antivirus. Why bother installing a mediocre antivirus like MSE/360 total security when you can get a much better one that is also free, crazy!

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gohpep

Posted
Posted

I find it bizare that people aren't voting for Avira considering it always wins in antivirus tests as the best free antivirus. Why bother installing a mediocre antivirus like MSE/360 total security when you can get a much better one that is also free, crazy!

Well it wins in protection, but not in performance, and 360 security can use the avira engine and bitdefender engine.

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Grand Master

oldtimefighter

Posted
Posted

MSE and Malwarebytes, all I need. Don't need any extra BS slowing down my system. 

MSE is rated useless so not sure why anyone would use it... This is the FREE AV poll so there would be no extra BS slowing your system down or are you using like a Pentium 4 system?

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Grand Master

oldtimefighter

Posted
Posted

I use Avast Free Antivirus and was thinking of checking out 360 Total Security since it was getting a lot of votes but then see it's a Chinese company. WTF people?

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Grand Master

oldtimefighter

Posted
Posted

360 internet security is a nice program but keep in mind it is made in China and its a communist country so yea you are running government Chinese software on your computer :)

 

No Norton Anti Virus on the vote chart?  I remember when that program was the top dog at the time.

Their non-free program is good but their stripped down free Norton Security Scan is almost malware.

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Rising Star

NeHoMaR

Posted
Posted

I am using 360TS, for months, it's light, the problem is almost every single exe is a false positive, basically all exes that are not popular. In my opinion this is not an antivirus, but an exe white list filter.

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Experienced

tompkin

Posted
Posted

My favorite ant-virus is Bitdefender though I don't use it. ( I need a free version.) :(

 

I had a curious thing happen when I did the 30-day trial of Bitdefender. 

 

I had a directory that had a number of '.exe' files (along with source (programming) example files that I had downloaded from Pluralsight.

 

When I did the initial complete scan, every one of the exe files in this particular directory was flagged as having a trojan. I had a second copy of these same exe's in a separate directory, on a separate drive that were not flagged. I ended up deleting all the files in that directory.

 

I'm not asking for assistance in this thread, just saying what happened. 

 

The thing I liked about Bitdefender was that it has a good rating for detecting malware and also it didn't seem to affect system speed to a noticeable degree.  (Y)

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