A study by AV-Test.org shows that when it comes to protecting your computer with free anti-virus software, you get what you pay for
Results from a recent test carried out by the security experts from AV-Test.org show that free security software provides inferior protection and produces more false alarms compared to fee-based software. In many instances, free software is the perfect alternative to fee-based software. There’s no need, for example, for today’s home users to pay for browsers or for photo / music organisation software. When it comes to antivirus software, however, things are different. This is the clear result of the test by AV-Test.org, which replicated the real-life user scenario as closely as possible. The results can be found here.
Free antivirus software has earned a significant share of the consumer security market. According to independent research company O+K, free solutions accounted for 66 per cent of anti-malware products used worldwide in October 2011. However, the comparative testing performed by AV-Test.org proves the point that paid products are more effective than free antivirus software. In direct competition with four leading free antivirus packages, Kaspersky Internet Security 2012 emerged the comprehensive winner in “real-world” testing.
Testing in a real-life user scenario
The testing was conducted by AV-Test.org in November and December 2011, and pitted Kaspersky Internet Security 2012 against four free antivirus solutions. The tests were conducted on several identical PCs running Windows 7 with Service Pack 1 installed. All updates available at the time of testing were applied. To recreate a typical PC environment several popular and potentially vulnerable programs were installed. The testing lab gathered 100 malicious web pages. Half of these tried to infect the system using drive-by downloads; the other half carried direct links to malicious files. The research replicated the real-life user scenario as closely as possible. Each threat was active at the moment of testing and evaluated on a clean system. The security products had up-to-date databases and, where applicable, were allowed to access the Internet to receive additional support from cloud-based services. The products were also tested for false positive detections against a database of slightly less than 200,000 fresh, clean files.
Perfect versus Patchwork Protection
Whenever the testers tried to download and launch a malicious file or visit an infected page, the malware was given some time to try to do its dirty work in the protected system – again, reflecting real life circumstances. After that, the test system was analysed for signs of infection. The results showed that Kaspersky Internet Security 2012 had completely blocked 99 out of 100 malicious objects, as well as the single malware attack launched. Kaspersky Lab’s product also returned a perfect result in the false positive test.
Freebies Falling Behind
The free products could not match the performance of Kaspersky Internet Security 2012. Microsoft Security Essentials had the worst result, with 86 threats blocked and 14 missed. Avira Free Antivirus 2012 completely missed 13 threats and only partially blocked one other. avast! Free Antivirus 6.0 blocked 95 threats, but completely missed another five. AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition 2012 completely missed four threats and partially blocked five other malicious objects. Two of the four “freebies” also wrongly identified clean programs as malicious: avast! Free Antivirus 6.0 gave one false positive and AVG Anti-Virus Free 2012 gave eight.
Commenting on the research, Oleg Ishanov, Deputy Director of Anti-Malware Research at Kaspersky Lab, said: “For us this testing confirms that there is only one way to effectively fight modern cybercrime: trust the best vendors of commercial security software and their strong expert teams. Free antivirus software indeed shows some level of protection in fighting malware threats but does not provide the same high level of security as a paid-for solution. Free antivirus users should reconsider this fact, especially when the cost for a month of paid-for protection is less than many people would spend on a cup of coffee each day.”
Detailed results of the comparison between Kaspersky Internet Security 2012 and four free antivirus solutions can be found here.
To learn more about the advantages of a paid-for antivirus solution, please visit: http://www.kaspersky.co.uk
