Free Antivirus Software Downloads
J-Mac's Recommended Free Antivirus Software
Here are the "Big Three" that I recommend and a good one for you MAC users:
AVG Antivirus and Security Software
"AVG helps you stay safe while you shop, bank online watch videos, search or surf the web, download music, documents and pictures, and email or chat. Every document or file you download, every web page or link you click on, is scanned by AVG before you open it. Unlike other security products, we stop the threats before they reach your hard drive and become a problem. Safe internet surfing is now possible." - AVG Home
Download AVG: http://free.avg.com/download?prd=afe
Avira AntiVir Personal
"FREE Antivirus Basic protection: Protects your computer against dangerous viruses, worms, Trojans and costly dialers. New: Basic Anti-Spyware." - Avira Home
Download Avira: http://www.free-av.com/en/download/index.html
Avast! Antivirus Home Edition
"Free antivirus software providing desktop security and data protection. avast! detects and removes all forms of malware, including spyware, rootkits and trojans. Free for home users." - avast! Home
Download avast!: http://www.avast.com/eng/download-avast-home.html
ClamXav for MAC
"ClamXav is a free virus checker for Mac OS X. It uses the tried, tested and very popular ClamAV open source antivirus engine as a back end." - ClamXav Home
ClamXav Home: http://www,clamxav.com=afe
Antivirus Software Reviews
If you want to see how the antivirus programs rate then check out these links and see how these free versions compare to the $50 a year programs.
This one is my favorite. It is a PDF file from May 2009 for research done by an independant research group. Their proactive test shows that Avira, Avast and AVG all outperform the big boys of Norton/Symantec and McAfee in what they call the proactive test. You can skip down a few pages to see the results if your not interested in reading about the tests: http://www.av-comparatives.org/images/stories/test/ondret/avc_report22.pdf.
Here is one from PC-Magazine that allows you to compare different programs against each other. This one is from early 2009: http://www.pcmag.com/category2/0,2806,4796,00.asp.
Here is one from Cnet rated by the people who actually use the programs: http://www.cnet.com/topic-reviews/antivirus.html.
Here is another one which shows the Free AVG version ranked higher than the $50 per year Norton product: http://www.consumersearch.com/antivirus-software.
If for some reason you would want to look at even more options than the three I mentioned above, take a look at Cnet. I love Cnet because they are a trusted site; they make sure all their downloads are clean and they have good download speed. Here is the listing page for the antivirus downloads on Cnet: http://download.cnet.com/windows/antivirus-software/.
Other Recommened Software and Sites
I have mentioned several great software downloads and web sites with good information throughout this site. Here, you will find links to all of them in one place.
View by:
Free Virus Scan & Removal
- Kaspersky Virus Removal Tools: http://usa.kaspersky.com/downloads/removaltools.php
- Check the list for your known virus and download the removal tool you'll need.
- Trend Micro Virus Scanner: http://housecall65.trendmicro.com.
- This will search your computer for a virus.
- This scanner will also delete the virus files unlike many other online scanners.
Malware, Adware & Spyware Removal
- MalwareBytes: http://www.malwarebytes.org
- SpyBot: http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html
- AdAware (an adware remover): http://www.lavasoft.com/products/ad_aware_free.php
Personal Firewall Protection
- Zone Alarm: http://www.auditmypc.com/web-security-resources.asp?cat_id=4
- Sunbelt's Personal Firewall: http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Home-Home-Office/Sunbelt-Personal-Firewall/