Ask HN: What antivirus do you run on Windows, if any? - BoorishBears
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AceStar
Windows has had its own antivirus (Security Essentials / Windows Defender) for
some time now. Do you have any reason not to trust it, or that it isn't
adequate?

Most large antivirus vendors don't fill me with a lot of confidence, and my
theory is that at least Microsoft's own solution is going to integrate well
and stay out of my face.

~~~
savethefuture
Keep in mind that Windows Defender uploads your files to the MS cloud for
scanning. [http://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2016/03/window...](http://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2016/03/windows-defender-advanced-threat-protection-uses-cloud-
power-to-figure-out-youve-been-pwned/) And generally any "large antivirus
vendor" is going to integrate just as well and can be non-intrusive as any
other.

~~~
AceStar
I used McAfee's suite once because I had to (corporate environment). It popped
up all the time wanting this or that. It relied on ActiveX for a lot of what
it did. Updates to it failed if your _system default browser_ was set to
something other than Internet Explorer.

I'm guessing it's moved on since then, but it lost my trust. I've had to use
Norton's suite before too and it had similar reliability issues.

Since using Security Essentials / Defender on Win7 and later it just works and
never needs any hand-holding.

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kek918
For my personal computer I use Microsoft Security Essentials / Windows
Defender. My biggest threat is when my kid is using my computer and playing on
some flash game websites, so all my user accounts are currently non-
administrators which atleast might mitigate some attempts.

However, at work it's a different picture. We have 300 "lusers" and everyone
are eager to click on the newest malware on the block with no thought of
consequences.

We've tried several AV products and right now we're using BitDefender which
seems to get the work done for the most parts. First time we ran it, It found
our (IT dep) 10 year old Red Alert 2 .exe crack so that was quite amusing. It
also has few false positives and hardly ever makes itself noticeable in
resource monitor.

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mikebos
I'm currently running Bitdefender, there's no real good reason for that except
the license for it was a cheap offer. There are some antivirus test like av-
test.org and av-comparatives.org and no doubt others. Personally I think an
adblocker and, notdownloading anything illegal and a decent spam filter are
more effective. The last time I had a virus was 10+ years back.

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puddintane
I use ESET Smart Security.

[1] [https://www.eset.com/int/home/smart-
security/](https://www.eset.com/int/home/smart-security/)

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veddox
Kaspersky has served my family very well. It's not free, but it's effective
(usually one of the top three in all the rankings I've seen) and it stays out
of the way. Good UI, too.

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infinii
Avira offers a free one that's served me well. In fact, I also started using
it on my OSX.

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romanovcode
If you don't download any cracks or whatnot the built in is perfectly fine.

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JoClimb1ng
For my home pc I use Norton Security since 2006. I'm still satisfied.

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svarnypetr
I am using Avast and prefered it over AVG which I tried earlier.

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hifunda
I use Bitdefender Free edition and no issues so far!

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t0mst0n
I using kaspersky internet security and it ok.

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pythonbull
I run Sophos for last 4 years.

