Is Windows Defender AV sufficient?

[airborne]

Having some performance issues with Avast and I have been advised to try Windows Defender AV but is it sufficient?

Some people also seem to imply Windows Defender has performance issues of its own, hogging resources etc, different AV but same bs?

That being said I haven't had a single virus issue for yrs, or even a virus detected, ever since Windows 7(never tried 8) and some people use no AV at all. Seems the viruses we knew in the past are still used as a bogus bogeyman to get people to use AV and pay for it.

Granted Ransomware etc is real but that seems to be installed whether you have AV or not and is a result of poor user judgement more than anything else.

 

[Masataka]

I used it for almost a year and never had issues but it doesn't have the greatest AV score so I've since switched over to Bitdefender, which didn't pick up any problems on its first scan which is a positive for Windows Defender.

 

[NetMpofu]

If you not downloading illegally then you safe with windows defender.

 

[agentrfr]

If you live on the brighter side of the internet only then Windows' Defender should be fine.

 

[airborne]

What pray tell are the better AV's stopping/preventing that Defender won't?

 

[biometrics]

What pray tell are the better AV's stopping/preventing that Defender won't?

You need to use common sense and safe computing practices.

Don't open dodgy email attachments. Don't download and run keygens or pirate games. An adblocker will help against dodgy adverts. Keep Flash etc up to date. Try not to insert other peoples flash drives in your PC and assume if you inserted yours into some elses that it is suspect. And so on ...

I use Microsoft Security Essentials on Windows 7 and never have an issue. Doesn't seem to have a performance hit.

 

[PeterBrand]

MS Security Essentials is enough for me as I don't visit many dodgy sites.

You can get much better bang for your buck in terms of performance and protection by downloading a HOST file, it cuts out adverts, drive-bys, trackers etc. by preventing your system even touching known black-listed sites. Get the best one free from http://winhelp2002.mvps.org/hosts.htm.

 

[SauRoNZA]

If you are on Windows 10 you already have it anyway.

 

[airborne]

If you are on Windows 10 you already have it anyway.

But the AV features are disabled if there is another AV installed.

 

[Masataka]

Can give this site a look AV Test Results.

 

[LazyLion]

I do all of those "unsafe things"... and MSE/Defender is all I have ever used for the last 10 years or so.
Never had a virus (as far as I know).

 

[Garson007]

Can give this site a look AV Test Results.

From there it seems it's only weak on day-zero threats. Unlikely to affect a user like myself.

 

[airborne]

What pray tell are the better AV's stopping/preventing that Defender won't?

I do all of those "unsafe things"... and MSE/Defender is all I have ever used for the last 10 years or so.
Never had a virus (as far as I know).

No ones managed to verbalise what the threats really are, the AV bogey man is working his job like a boss!

AV industry is a multi billion dollar industry.

Granted businesses, especially those running public frontends/websites and servers may genuinely need some intrusion protection but that's more firewall from what I understand.

 

[profeet]

If you not downloading illegally then you safe with windows defender.

That is?

I do all of those "unsafe things"... and MSE/Defender is all I have ever used for the last 10 years or so.
Never had a virus (as far as I know).

the AV bogey man

Those haxors lined up to get my through my wifi

// checks window

 

[milomak]

if you are security aware, you can even run a computer without av

though with windows, the default should probably run

 

[backstreetboy]

But the AV features are disabled if there is another AV installed.

Then uninstall the other POS and just use MSE/Defender.

https://bugs.chromium.org/p/project-zero/issues/detail?id=546&redir=1

Avast will render the commonName of X.509 certificates into an HTMLLayout frame when your MITM proxy detects a bad signature. Unbelievably, this means CN="<h1>really?!?!?</h1>" actually works, and is pretty simple to convert into remote code execution.

To verify this bug, I've attached a demo certificate for you. Please find attached key.pem, cert.pem and cert.der. Run this command to serve it from a machine with openssl:

$ sudo openssl s_server -key key.pem -cert cert.pem -accept 443

Then visit that https server from a machine with Avast installed. Click the message that appears to demonstrate launching calc.exe.

Thanks, Tavis.

This bug is subject to a 90 day disclosure deadline. If 90 days elapse
without a broadly available patch, then the bug report will automatically
become visible to the public.

They are all snake oil anyway. As long as it gets virus definitions every day you'll be fine.

Also there's a billion threads about this already. Fink it's high time there's a sticky in the Software section about this...

 

[Toilet_Vis]

Win defender is 60% accurate ive read somewhere
better to go with something else
depends on your habbits
in the wrong places bit even the best av would help