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Microsoft have just announced that Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE), their free anti-malware software, will be released as a beta on Tuesday 23rd of June.
According to Microsoft, the produce will protect against viruses, spyware, rootkits and trojans, and will use little by the way of system resources.
Many consumers and businesses alike are delighted by the news, and hope to be able to ditch their existing applications when the next billing cycle is due. But companies like AVG, Kaspersky and Symantec are probably less than delighted.
If the product turns out to be little more than a basic, less than reliable freebie, then it won’t ripple the market.
If, however, it proves to be effective, then we may all be in trouble.
Customers benefit from competition. The main reason for the high quality of the existing solutions is that they’re all fighting for customers.
If Microsoft’s product turns out to be a roaring success, it may seriously maim some of the long-standing names in the industry.
Even the strongest and most robust of industries may be reduced to a fragile ecosystem when a new giant goes blundering in.
On the other hand, the new product may serve as new competition, inspiring the existing antivirus companies to get that little more serious.
Light a fire under an industry, and the main players get active. Allow the fire to spread and everything may be destroyed.
I recommend ComboFix and SuperAntiSpyware (both free anti-malware solutions, and both also the dot-com names by which to find them) to all of my friends, any of my family who care enough to use computers, and most of my clients. Free software is not a bad thing; it already floods the market, and there are plenty of good solutions and alternatives for everything you pay to do on a PC. There are even some pretty good Mac freeware apps (TinyApps for instance, a dot-org site, has some good ones).
I hate to sound negative, but any time the giant blundering in is Microsoft, it’s time to beware and be cautious adopting it. It might look good at first on the surface, but under the hood it could be crippled, open to exploitation like other MS products, or monopolistic. None of which are good for the user.
I suppose Microsoft have to get their act together if they are going to compete with Apple for security. Apple does OK without the market helping. Of course Microsoft may need more companies helping them out since the number of people hacking on them may be disproportionate even given their market share given how many people resent what they’ve done to the industry, and how many kids just go after number one.
I don’t think the top-tier anti-malware makers have much to worry about. Microsoft already offers a free anti-spyware program (Windows Defender). It’s a free download for XP and Server 2003 and comes with (and is enabled by default on) Vista and Windows 7. It’s been available for several years now and it still sucks (although, admittedly, not as much as it did at first). Install it if you want to see your $1000 laptop run like a $200 netbook. Microsoft also ships the, free, malicious software (anti-malware/anti-rootkit) removal tool once a month via Windows Update.
Most computer users these days (escpecially those that use the Internet regularly) know they should own and regularly use serveral (i.e., more than two) anti-malware applications. I can’t tell you how many times two of my anti-malware programs (but not the same two) have missed a trojan or keylogger only to have the third one nail it.
Nothing to see here. Please move along…
While I do agree with you, Dave, there are other issues here that need to be considered too, I think.
1. Security *should* be the primary concern of an OS developer – ie – MS.
2. We are suffering from a system presently where many AV solutions are as bad in some respects as the conditions they seek to rembedy. Slowing down of system, bloated, not always reliable, driven themselves by greed (in some instances) and not security and indeed some have been guilty of unfair practices in the insdustry (the attacks on Panda for example).
3. Many existing packages actually interfere with workflow with useless interuptions designed to promote and sell product *even after you have paid*. System modal alerts, voices that braodcast updates, that are turned off but then turned on again after updates. Extremely painful if one is sitting in front of a system hooked up to a high powered sound system. Etc.