SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Kaspersky has finally launched its free antivirus software after a year-and-a-half of testing it in select regions. While the software was only available in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, China and in Nordic countries during its trial run, Kaspersky is releasing it worldwide. The free antivirus doesn't have VPN, Parental Controls and Online Payment Protection its paid counterpart offers, but it has all the essential features you need to protect your PC. It can scan files and emails, protect your PC while you use the web and quarantine malware that infects your system.
The company says the software isn't riddled with advertisements like other free antivirus offerings. Instead of trying to make ad money off your patronage, Kaspersky will use the data you contribute to improve machine learning across its products. The free antivirus will be available in the US, Canada and most Asia-Pacific countries over the next couple of days, if it isn't yet. After this initial release, the company will roll it out in other regions from September to November.
Source:
Kaspersky launches its free antivirus software worldwide
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 26 2017, @09:39PM (1 child)
An OS whose development -starts- with a security model is a much better idea.
Trying to paste on "security" afterwards is obviously completely backwards.
...and I just have to swivel my head every time I think that Windoze didn't even include a firewall before XP SP1, didn't activate the firewall by default until XP SP2, and didn't have one that would filter OUTBOUND packets until XP SP3.
Glad I found something that was built properly from the start.
Gratis and libre was the icing on the cake.
From that point:
- do your updates.
- don't run as root.
- get your software from non-dodgy places.
...and for those who are still nervous, sandbox your apps. [google.com]
(Also gratis and libre.)
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by TheLink on Thursday July 27 2017, @03:31AM
The AV approach in theory is harder than solving the halting problem ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_problem [wikipedia.org] ) since in many cases you don't even have the full inputs or source but you are supposed to determine whether the program is malicious. In practice imperfect solutions are acceptable, and popular useful programs tend to not be infinitely diverse.
I still believe the sandboxing approach is the more effective path for securing an OS for normal users (I proposed this 10 years ago: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/156693 [launchpad.net] ). There are better ways of doing sandboxing for OSes than the ways mobile OSes are currently doing it.
Sandboxing is like "solving" the halting problem by ensuring that a program will eventually halt no matter what the code or the inputs are.