I was at a friends last night giving their PC a check over - I would call this more akin to a yearly car service. My friend asked the question I usually get - what security protection do you use?
Nowadays being a linux user I have AV installed but don't use it in realtime and either use the built in linux firewall or rely on my router's firewall. Due to the lack of linux based malware or viruses I am confident this will keep my machine clear but am still wary what I either download or click on. In time this may change as more people begin to use linux but now it is relatively secure. I mentioned this to my friend but did say on the two windows machines that I have I use freely available products such as Free AVG and spybot. Using these and being wary what is either being downloaded or clicked on are usually sufficient to catch most things.
My friend was running McAffee that was bundled with his broadband provider but costs per year. He was quite surprised to find that Spybot found something and then asked why did McAffee miss it? I explained this could either be that his AV doesn't know about it or is not set up to catch these items. I reiterated my first point that I do not see the point in paying for these products when there good products freely available.
When I was managing the IT within a business I have used enterprise products from Symantec, McAffee and Sophos - Whilst they all "sort of" worked there were many issues related to not downloading the updates to the machines correctly, sometimes stopping machines from working or the AV not working at all because one of the critical components had not started. I have previously written scripts or created bespoke systems to resolve some of these issues after becoming increasingly frustrated with the supplier not being able to give me a working resolution. I believe if there were free AV and spyware tools available for the enterprise which included deployment and management tools that these coupled with a managed locked down environment, that this should be sufficient to tackle most malware/virus threats.
However there isn't and of course the big companies have invested in their products so need to make their money back and continue to provide a service.
For the home user I have found my strategy of using the freely available tools and with a little education then this should be sufficient. I am not saying people should not purchase the commercial tools, but have found these tools put a false sense of security on people that they will magically resolve all issues when realistically people should manage their systems. It is a like having a car, you take it for an mot, you take for a service and then you usually look out for noises or other signs that the vehicle might not be working correctly. Again this is the same with a PC and people should look out for issues and seek professional guidance when they are unsure. My friend did this, we found something and now everything is okay.
What I really hate about the commercial tools is their over complexity and reliance on so many components in order to run. Whilst I know viruses/malware are becoming more clever, is it really necessary to make these tools more complex so that they can fall over more?
Spybot and Free AVG are examples of simple tools that just work and there is nothing complex. They cover the basics in security but it is a real shame that the commercially available security tools do not follow the principle keep it simple.
Nowadays being a linux user I have AV installed but don't use it in realtime and either use the built in linux firewall or rely on my router's firewall. Due to the lack of linux based malware or viruses I am confident this will keep my machine clear but am still wary what I either download or click on. In time this may change as more people begin to use linux but now it is relatively secure. I mentioned this to my friend but did say on the two windows machines that I have I use freely available products such as Free AVG and spybot. Using these and being wary what is either being downloaded or clicked on are usually sufficient to catch most things.
My friend was running McAffee that was bundled with his broadband provider but costs per year. He was quite surprised to find that Spybot found something and then asked why did McAffee miss it? I explained this could either be that his AV doesn't know about it or is not set up to catch these items. I reiterated my first point that I do not see the point in paying for these products when there good products freely available.
When I was managing the IT within a business I have used enterprise products from Symantec, McAffee and Sophos - Whilst they all "sort of" worked there were many issues related to not downloading the updates to the machines correctly, sometimes stopping machines from working or the AV not working at all because one of the critical components had not started. I have previously written scripts or created bespoke systems to resolve some of these issues after becoming increasingly frustrated with the supplier not being able to give me a working resolution. I believe if there were free AV and spyware tools available for the enterprise which included deployment and management tools that these coupled with a managed locked down environment, that this should be sufficient to tackle most malware/virus threats.
However there isn't and of course the big companies have invested in their products so need to make their money back and continue to provide a service.
For the home user I have found my strategy of using the freely available tools and with a little education then this should be sufficient. I am not saying people should not purchase the commercial tools, but have found these tools put a false sense of security on people that they will magically resolve all issues when realistically people should manage their systems. It is a like having a car, you take it for an mot, you take for a service and then you usually look out for noises or other signs that the vehicle might not be working correctly. Again this is the same with a PC and people should look out for issues and seek professional guidance when they are unsure. My friend did this, we found something and now everything is okay.
What I really hate about the commercial tools is their over complexity and reliance on so many components in order to run. Whilst I know viruses/malware are becoming more clever, is it really necessary to make these tools more complex so that they can fall over more?
Spybot and Free AVG are examples of simple tools that just work and there is nothing complex. They cover the basics in security but it is a real shame that the commercially available security tools do not follow the principle keep it simple.
Comments
Post a Comment