Computers have impacted everything in our lives that includes helping students learn how to learn, to monitoring patients in hospitals, to regulating crucial manufacturing processes. The increased dependence on computer gadgets has also brought an increase in cyberthreats including malware, viruses and ransomware. Antivirus software is designed to detect these threats and prevent them from causing harm to your PC or stealing your personal information.
When selecting an antivirus software, you should consider its ability to scan for viruses, whether it has a firewall and how well it performs in independent laboratory tests. You may also consider its customer service, how often the program updates itself and the number of devices it is able to secure. Certain programs, such as Norton, have additional features that help secure your online privacy and prevent identity theft.
The best programs offer various protection options that include heuristic detection, which is a method of identifying patterns in behavior typical of malware or viruses, and signature matching, which checks files against a list of known malware. Some programs use sandboxing to separate suspicious files from an environment that is secured and where they cannot do any harm.
Many of the top antivirus programs are available for free, although they may not come with as many extra features as paid-for alternatives. Bitdefender’s premium version comes with parental controls, a file shredder and password manager, but its free version scored well and also comes with a firewall. Malwarebytes which is free and scored top marks in AV Test for 2023, did not pass our test of usability. Intego Mac Security X9 offers an effective combination of tools, including VirusBarrier and NetBarrier. They removed and identified the most malware threats we tested.