I try to touch on a variety of topics in here, although this one is always a valid one to work with. Many people ask about different anti-virus software, and I always have to give the same answer – I don’t believe that there is any ONE ‘cure’ to the many threats you expose yourself to when you use the internetemail.
There are ways to protect yourself better through your own habits – stay away from high risk sites, such as music download and those sites you wouldn’t want your grandchildren to see. There are ways to protect yourself by learning the different scams people use to try and trick you (Google ‘phishing’, ‘social engineering’) and when you get emails advising you to send this message to everyone in your address book – ALWAYS try using what you see in the subject line to search on www.snopes.com before you send it on to anyone else. Many viruses spread through accessing address books without the knowledge of the person who supposedly send the original messages.
I personally (this viewpoint may be my own…) believe that no individual anti-virus can keep all threats at bay – so I believe in doubling up. I don’t mean installing three different anti-virus programs, as well as multiple malware scanners, firewalls, defender programs, and so on. If you install more than one anti-virus program on the same computer, they may even interfere with each other to the point that it slows your computer down more than a virus would.
I recommend one anti-virus program, along with a strong malware scanning program. There are many decent free or paid for anti-virus softwares available – drop me a line on my Facebook page if you would like specific recommendations. The one malware scanner that I will recommend without any prompting is Malwarebytes. Update this program at least monthly, and run it regularly – if you see no results in a Quick Scan, and I think you will be doing fairly well.
Any questions? Please feel free to ask on the Guidedog Facebook Page