Android AVs - Anyone use them?

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SCHUMI-4-EVA

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I'm just curious who out there feels it's necessary run Antivirus apps on Android?

About a month ago my sister got a funny message which prompted her to download Avast for Mobile to just scan the system in case there was an immediate threat. Since then however she's been complaining about this or that niggle in day to day use and eventually decided yesterday that her cell had been much happier/more reliable before she installed the app and thus got rid of it.

I've never thought of AV software on Android as essential but apparently AVG has a semi-premium version for people with Xperia devices so I figured since it had been specially provided I might as well get it. But I've noticed it's pretty much just an annoyance that I constantly override or ignore so I don't see much point to it and also want to get rid of it.


So I'm just wondering what the consensus is these days? Are AVs on Android still considered superfluous apps? Or do some of you now consider them more essential and not something an active smartphone should be without?
 
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Nope. As long as you stick to the Play Store I am of the opinion that you are okay.
That's the opinion of Android Central too.
 
I have seen 1 virus out of 200+ phones, being used by non tech savvy people, so I don't think you should worry
 
Raithlin said:
Nope. As long as you stick to the Play Store I am of the opinion that you are okay.
Click to expand...

I occasionally install things from outside the Play Store though. But that's the thing cuz even if an AV flashed a warning at me I'd likely treat it as a false positive and ignore it/override it so even then the AV wouldn't serve any purpose until after I'm infected and then I could just as well simply get the AV at that stage.
 
SCHUMI-4-EVA said:
I occasionally install things from outside the Play Store though. But that's the thing cuz even if an AV flashed a warning at me I'd likely treat it as a false positive and ignore it/override it so even then the AV wouldn't serve any purpose until after I'm infected and then I could just as well simply get the AV at that stage.
Click to expand...
If you know what you are doing... My advice stands for the normal user.
 
Raithlin said:
Nope. As long as you stick to the Play Store I am of the opinion that you are okay.
That's the opinion of Android Central too.
Click to expand...

This.

I downloaded some warez once (spy vs spy) as an APK, and installed it. Something crawled onto my phone, made it sluggish and a battery/CPU hog.

Downloaded and scanned with a variety of those AV's - found nothing.

Did a factory reset, and all was well. Once is enough, never again.

So far I haven't had any issues although I installed a lot of apps from the play store. One trick to ensure an app's popularity (and, by implication, safety) is to check how many times it's been downloaded. If it's a paltry number (below 1000 or so) then avoid it, until such time more people have had the chance to download and play with said app before you do.
 
The_Librarian said:
So far I haven't had any issues although I installed a lot of apps from the play store. One trick to ensure an app's popularity (and, by implication, safety) is to check how many times it's been downloaded. If it's a paltry number (below 1000 or so) then avoid it, until such time more people have had the chance to download and play with said app before you do.
Click to expand...

On that topic I wish the Play Store allowed sorting by downloads, ratings and number of reviews. You sometimes have to wade through lists of chaff till you find that one app every appears to have with a few 100K and then on the next page (after installing) you find the one everyone actually has with over a mill.

I'll say again though no everything outside the Play Store is warez, some of it is legit 3rd party devving that simply hasn't made it to the Play Store.
 
Used Sophos and now lately Bitdefender as I sideload a lot. What I liked about Sophos is that it can scan the APK before install but that process started taking very long after a specific update - I suspect it actually sandboxes the APK as part of scanning it.
 
SCHUMI-4-EVA said:
I'm just curious who out there feels it's necessary run Antivirus apps on Android?

About a month ago my sister got a funny message which prompted her to download Avast for Mobile to just scan the system in case there was an immediate threat. Since then however she's been complaining about this or that niggle in day to day use and eventually decided yesterday that her cell had been much happier/more reliable before she installed the app and thus got rid of it.

I've never thought of AV software on Android as essential but apparently AVG has a semi-premium version for people with Xperia devices so I figured since it had been specially provided I might as well get it. But I've noticed it's pretty much just an annoyance that I constantly override or ignore so I don't see much point to it and also want to get rid of it.


So I'm just wondering what the consensus is these days? Are AVs on Android still considered superfluous apps? Or do some of you now consider them more essential and not something an active smartphone should be without?
Click to expand...

depends... do you pronz?
 
cpu. said:
It's called an ad. Best to ignore all ads.
Click to expand...

Oh no. I didn't mean "prompted" like that.
It was a strange SMS that almost seemed to be based on some info on the phone (although it was vague enough to have just been a cold read scam attempt to infiltrate a real threat) so she thought she better check for any funny business and thus decided to get Avast for Mobile.
 
SCHUMI-4-EVA said:
What exactly IS sideloading? Simply installing something from outside the Play Store? Or something more advanced?
Click to expand...

download the app .apk (application package file) <- basically the installation files, and installing it on your phone.

I sideload, but only apk's downloaded from apk mirror, which is a AndroidPolice site.
 
Oh, then same basically. And as I said I'd likely ignore any warnings when doing so anyways even if getting from dodgier sources (I've been conditioned like that by PC, got so many false positives on there that I keep running into exception list limits) so I don't see how protection at the time would help.
 
No. "Antivirus" apps on Android are a waste of money and system resources.

For 99% of users, the only security measures you need to take are the following:

1. Under "Security":
- Disable "Allow installation of apps that from sources other than the Play Store"
- Enable Screen Lock

2. Under "Google Settings":
- Enable "Allow remote lock and erase"
- Enable "Scan device for security threats"

These settings should be enabled by default on most Android devices anyway.
 
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