Microsoft has officially unveiled its long-awaited consumer antivirus offering. Formerly code-named “Morro,†it's now been christened Microsoft Security Essentials, and it will enter public beta testing next week. If you have a licensed copy of Windows XP (Service Pack 2 or above), Windows Vista, or Windows 7, you'll be able to download and install the software at no additional charge. No subscription is required for ongoing definition updates, either. The final release is scheduled for this fall.
Microsoft Security Essentials requires validation, which means it won't be available to anyone using a pirated copy of Windows. But it won't require registration or personal information of any kind.
If you get a sense of deja vu when you see Microsoft Security Essentials, that's no accident. It's a pure superset of Microsoft's antispyware product, Windows Defender, which was publicly released nearly three years ago and is included by default with Windows Vista and Windows 7. Microsoft Security Essentials adds antivirus protection—both real-time protection and on-demand scanning—to the mix. It shares the same engine and signatures as other Microsoft antimalware products, including the enterprise-focused Forefront and the monthly Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool.
Microsoft says the program is, not surprisingly, Windows Logo Certified and updates its virus and spyware signatures daily through Microsoft Update. New signatures are published three times a day, which means that clients will never get a new update that is less than eight hours old. The core antimalware engine, with new features and bug fixes, is scheduled for updates on a monthly basis. If Automatic Update is enabled, this process will be completely transparent to the user, Microsoft claims.
Like most modern antivirus software, MSE relies on up-to-date signatures, but adds its own cloud-based twists. Contrary to some recent reports, this isn't a cloud-based service. Instead, it offers a dynamic signature service that pushes signatures on a daily basis, but adds the ability to query the signature service when need to reduce the window of exposure to new malware. By monitoring for suspicious behavior, the service can query for a sample when necessary. Rootkit detection features target kernel-mode malware and can detect the sort of tampering in the kernel that is typical of rootkits.
How good is the coverage? Microsoft scored dismal test results in the early days of OneCare, hitting a nadir in 2007, but its record has improved dramatically since. A new study (May 2009) by the independent AV-Comparatives group gave Microsoft OneCare (which shares the same engine and signatures as MSE) its highest (Advanced+) rating. Only 3 of the 16 products in the test earned that rating. Microsoft's technology scored second in the accuracy ratings, behind AVIRA but ahead of AVG, Symantec, McAfee, and a dozen other products. And on the crucial measure of delivering the fewest false positives, Microsoft stood far ahead of the pack, delivering the fewest false positives of any program tested.
In the most recent round of tests from the independent ICSA Labs, Microsoft's technology passed, while McAfee's VirusScan family joined several smaller competitors on the FAIL list.
Source
Microsoft Security Essentials requires validation, which means it won't be available to anyone using a pirated copy of Windows. But it won't require registration or personal information of any kind.
If you get a sense of deja vu when you see Microsoft Security Essentials, that's no accident. It's a pure superset of Microsoft's antispyware product, Windows Defender, which was publicly released nearly three years ago and is included by default with Windows Vista and Windows 7. Microsoft Security Essentials adds antivirus protection—both real-time protection and on-demand scanning—to the mix. It shares the same engine and signatures as other Microsoft antimalware products, including the enterprise-focused Forefront and the monthly Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool.
Microsoft says the program is, not surprisingly, Windows Logo Certified and updates its virus and spyware signatures daily through Microsoft Update. New signatures are published three times a day, which means that clients will never get a new update that is less than eight hours old. The core antimalware engine, with new features and bug fixes, is scheduled for updates on a monthly basis. If Automatic Update is enabled, this process will be completely transparent to the user, Microsoft claims.
Like most modern antivirus software, MSE relies on up-to-date signatures, but adds its own cloud-based twists. Contrary to some recent reports, this isn't a cloud-based service. Instead, it offers a dynamic signature service that pushes signatures on a daily basis, but adds the ability to query the signature service when need to reduce the window of exposure to new malware. By monitoring for suspicious behavior, the service can query for a sample when necessary. Rootkit detection features target kernel-mode malware and can detect the sort of tampering in the kernel that is typical of rootkits.
How good is the coverage? Microsoft scored dismal test results in the early days of OneCare, hitting a nadir in 2007, but its record has improved dramatically since. A new study (May 2009) by the independent AV-Comparatives group gave Microsoft OneCare (which shares the same engine and signatures as MSE) its highest (Advanced+) rating. Only 3 of the 16 products in the test earned that rating. Microsoft's technology scored second in the accuracy ratings, behind AVIRA but ahead of AVG, Symantec, McAfee, and a dozen other products. And on the crucial measure of delivering the fewest false positives, Microsoft stood far ahead of the pack, delivering the fewest false positives of any program tested.
In the most recent round of tests from the independent ICSA Labs, Microsoft's technology passed, while McAfee's VirusScan family joined several smaller competitors on the FAIL list.
Source
