Free Anti-Virus Protection other than Windows Defender / Security Essentials

Tyster

Member
Hi.

Does anyone know of a good, free anti-virus protection software that I can install? Having too many problems with Windows Defender / Security Essentials.

Any and all help would be appreciated. Would also be helpful if it would allow me to scan individual files or folders by right clicking on the file or folder and then selecting "scan."
 

Agent Smith

Well-Known Member
Bitdefender Free. Light weight, cloud based and is pretty good on definitions. However, definition based malware detection isn't going to stop a lot of zero-day stuff like ransomware. That's why you should at least use Sandboxie for your browser. Keep in mind that when you use Sandboxie and you want to update the browser, you have to launch the browser without Sandboxie and then update. Also, I would, at reduced security allow access to your browser's profile so addons can update. Once you use the sandbox everything stays in the sandbox and nothing touches your computer.

Bitdefender Free integrates into the Windows right click context menu to scan individual folder/files. It's a little different though. Sometimes you have to double click the Bitdefender icon in the taskbar and see if it's clean. I would personally install Malwarebytes, use the free version and righ click scan with that. Just keep Malwarebytes' definitions updated. Bitdefender has the right click facility, but like I said it's different. Your absolute best way to scan a file would be to upload it to virustotal.com.
 
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