Evaluating Your Guard: What Makes a Strong Anti-Virus Program?

The internet can be the source of some pretty frightening things. When you happen to be a computer or a gadget, those frightening things take the form of viruses and malicious software. These, if left alone to ravage a computer or system, can mean irreparable damage and often leaves the owner of the system (and the information contained within that system) at risk.

In order to protect yourself and your system from potential cyber attacks, viruses, and malware, it is critical that you have a strong anti-virus program installed. One which you can be sure will not let you down nor will be nuisance with unnecessary billing. Before we dive into that, we’d like to welcome you back to Fishnet! As always we are you number one partner for all discussions pertaining to the use of the internet and the general subject of the World Wide Web!

We are always thankful for the massive support that we have been enjoying for the past months and we certainly appreciate all the questions and the comments that we have been receiving! So now, let’s jump right into the discussion!

What Is an Anti-Virus Program? 

In its base definition, an antivirus program or AVS or AV software is pretty much any program which is installed in a system for the purpose of detecting, isolation, and removal of any malicious software or programs which try to penetrate the system of the computer or the Operating System.

This is critical for any person that wants to make use of the internet because the net is full of potential vulnerabilities. Here are a few examples of those vulnerabilities:

Keyloggers

Keyloggers are programs or software which is embedded in seemingly innocuous websites or links which are actually made to record and log your key strokes. These, of course, refer to the keys of your keyboard. A keylogger program will record the characters that you enter as your username or password for a particular account whether it be an email, work site, or a bank website.

Ransomware

Ransomware refers to a program which hijacks your system and makes it completely inaccessible to you. You can try to open up your computer only to be greeted with a screen with specific instructions on how you can get your system back. It will usually involve money which is wired to a particular account. A follow-up threat which will usually consist of either publishing sensitive information or deleting important files will follow if you do not pay the ransom for your system.

E-Bombing

This refers to a virus which affects your system by opening window after window all over your screen. The windows will usually be large and will show explicit photos of people in highly sexual situations. Basically, they bomb your system with various forms of pornography. This can be quite embarrassing for anyone who has been a victim of this as the fast opening windows are nearly impossible to close manually and will normally require a system wipe or a powerful anti-virus program to contain and kill it.

These are only a few of the malware that exists in the web. At any point in time, you can be a victim of one of these things. This is why it is utterly important for you to have a strong antivirus program. However, how do you know exactly that you have a strong one?

What Makes a Strong Antivirus Program?

A strong antivirus program is ideally what is needed to limit your exposure and risk to malware and other forms of viruses which can infiltrate your computer or gadget because of unsecure web browsing or irresponsible internet habits. We often asked ourselves if our own antivirus programs were strong ones and we realized that we needed to set a standard.

These are a few good standards to have regarding an antivirus program:

Scans Fast

When it comes to mitigating the damage that comes from malware, speed is vital. When you think that your system has been compromised, you can start a manual scan of your computer and its files to see if your system has been infiltrated. In times like this, it would be terrible if the malware gets to act faster than your antivirus program.

A scan should ideally take only a few minutes but should never exceed five minutes—especially when your computer doesn’t have that many files. In that span of time, the malware may have already activated and started its programming.

Stellar Detection Rate

Before malware can even truly penetrate your system, a good antivirus system will be able to detect that a threat has tried to do so. Your antivirus program is always running in the background and should instantly trigger if you are planning to download a tainted program or have inserted compromised discs or USBs.

The detection rate of your antivirus software should be at least 97%.

Grows Its Database

There are always newer and newer threats that are being developed every day of the year. A good and strong antivirus program will always be constantly updating and growing its database of viruses and malware in order to have the necessary information it needs to stop threats from getting into your computer system.

You should check if your antivirus system is one which updates its database regularly.

Uncomplicated

It would make no sense for your antivirus program to be one that will require rocket science in order to work or to be utilized properly. A good antivirus program will only have a few settings to configure which will normally comprise of:

• How often it scans
• How often it updates
• What it scans first
• What the alarm notification will sound like

Other than that, there shouldn’t be any other problem that complicates things. Your antivirus program should be like a favorite keychain that you put in your pocket and promptly forget about it. When you bother to remember it, you will still feel it there and will provide the same comfort and security that you need but won’t be hampering your day to day movements.

So with that, we hope that you have a better idea of what makes a strong antivirus program! Now we want you to think about this: is the present antivirus program you have running in your PC or gadget like the one we’ve described as? What do you think makes a strong antivirus program?