- Pros
Good ratings from independent antivirus test labs. Streamlined user interface. Many options for malware cleanup. Website reputation check. Do Not Track. Checks for unpatched applications. Can install and scan in Safe Mode.
- Cons
Where is the system log in avast for mac. Middling score in malware-blocking test. Heuristic malware detection blocked some valid programs. Difficult to exclude wrongly-blocked programs. Phishing protection weak.
- Bottom Line
avast! Free Antivirus 2014 boasts a newly streamlined user interface and some interesting new features. With 200 million users it's definitely a contender in the free antivirus space.
Silver is the traditional gift on a twenty-fifth anniversary, and Avast is one of the few antivirus companies that's been around long enough to reach that milestone. The installer for avast! Free Antivirus 2014 celebrates the company's silver anniversary status as well as the company's 200 million users worldwide.
Jan 12, 2014 greetings, installed the free avast! Anti-virus software earlier today & ran a scan on my imac. Results showed 2 infections of - Win32:Injector-AEO[Trj]. So i did a quick search & found that the win32 virus should have no effect on a mac. Is that true? But that i could possible infect others pc's? Also found that avast! Is know for false positives, presumably so they can get you to upgrade to. Free Antivirus 2014 boasts a newly streamlined user interface and some interesting new features. With 200 million users it's definitely a contender in the free antivirus space.
In the malware protection test, which was most recently held in September 2017, Avast once again led the way with a near-perfect 99.99% protection rate while returning 9 false positives. McAfee’s protection rate was a shade lower that Avast’s, at 99.86%, but it only rang 2 false alarms. Just ran V8.0 on a Mac running OSX 10.9.2 and got a bunch of alerts all in the invisible Spotlight directory, all are txts with the tag HTML:BANKFRAUD-BUT with variations and a couple identified as Phishes. We were recently bombarded with email from Avast users because suddenly, without warning, Avast detected Cloudeight CalenderPal as being infected with the virus: Win32:Evo-gen. Avast is well-known for its high rate of false-positives. Just ran V8.0 on a Mac running OSX 10.9.2 and got a bunch of alerts all in the invisible Spotlight directory, all are txts with the tag HTML:BANKFRAUD-BUT with variations and a couple identified as Phishes. Yesterday, I reported on an issue with Avast identifying my site’s RSS news feed as MacOS:WireLurker-A. However, that post changed over the course of the day, as further testing showed that my initial assumptions were slightly off and more facts came to light. Today, after having had some time to.
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As part of the celebration, the product's user interface has gotten a complete makeover. The main window reports security status and offers three big icons linking to important program features, plus a fourth marked 'Add.' Click that last one to add your own favorite feature, or right-click any of the four to swap features you use most; nice!
The 2014 edition also streamlines its collection of real time 'shields' against malware. Previously users were confronted with status and configuration options for eight distinct shields. Those eight have been rolled up into three easy-to-understand shields: File System Shield, Web Shield, and Mail Shield. I like the new approach.
Good Ratings from the Labs
Avast participated in all of the last 12 tests by Virus Bulletin and received VB100 certification in ten of those tests. ICSA Labs and West Coast labs both certify Avast's technology for virus detection; Avast didn't participate in the malware cleanup test by those labs. AV-Comparatives rated Avast ADVANCED for file detection; it rated STANDARD in another test that specifically measured how well products cleaned up malware they detected.
Protection against new malware attack is an essential antivirus feature, and Avast did well in several tests aimed at measuring protection. AV-Comparatives rated it ADVANCED+, the top rating, in a dynamic test using the very latest malware. AV-Test gave it 5.5 of 6.0 possible points for protection, and Dennis Technology Labs certified Avast at the AA level (AAA is the top rating).
False positives, valid programs blocked as malicious, can be a real problem. Avast didn't lose points for false positives in tests by AV-Comparatives or Dennis Labs. Getting a good Usability score from AV-Test requires few or no false positives; Avast earned 6.0 of 6.0 possible points. However, as you'll see later, it generated some significant false positives in my own tests.
In two performance tests, Avast's results differed quite a bit. AV-Comparatives rated it ADVANCED+, while AV-Test assigned it 3.0 of 6.0 possible points. Overall, Avast gets good marks from the labs.
For a full explanation of the way I interpret and aggregate tests results from the various independent testing labs, please see How We Interpret Antivirus Lab Tests.
Decent Malware Blocking
Starting with this review, I've added a new malware blocking test using a feed of malicious URLs supplied by MRG-Effitas. Each URL is no more than a day or so old, but even so by the time I use them in testing many are already defunct. I keep trying URLs until I've accumulated a hundred or so, recording whether the antivirus blocked access to the URL, quarantined the download, or just did nothing.
Avast's Web Shield jumped in to block URL access for 69 percent of the samples. It quarantined another 10 percent at some point during the download process, for a total of 79 percent blocked. Since this is the first data point for this test, I can't say whether that's a good score or not; time will tell.
Continuing my malware-block testing, I opened a folder containing my current collection of malware samples. For many antivirus products, the minimal file access that occurs when Windows Explorer checks a file's attributes for display is enough to trigger an on-access scan. Avast! waits for a click, so I dutifully clicked up and down the list, noting which items got sent to quarantine. In the end, avast! whacked 78 percent of the samples.
Avast cleanup for mac. I launched the remaining samples and noted the product's behavior. In one case, it launched the new special DeepScreen scan, then quarantined the file. However, it missed several others. Its overall detection rate was 92 percent. That's decent, but AVG AntiVirus FREE 2014, Avira Free AntiVirus (2014), and Ashampoo Anti-Virus 2014 all managed 97 percent.
With 8.9 points overall for malware blocking, avast! is in the lower half of products tested with the same malware collection. Quite a few products are tied for first place, 9.4 points, including AVG, Avira, and Ad-Aware Free Antivirus+ 10.5. For full details on how I perform this test, see How We Test Malware Blocking.
avast! Free Antivirus 2014
Bottom Line: avast! Free Antivirus 2014 boasts a newly streamlined user interface and some interesting new features. With 200 million users it's definitely a contender in the free antivirus space.
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