In a discussion with tech.blorge.com , David Hall, who is Symantec’s Product Manager for Asia-Pacific Consumer Products and Solutions, voices his concerns over the popularity of free antivirus programs. “People tell me, ‘oh well look I use free antivirus because it is free and it protects me from everything in those areas,’ but when you compare that with what’s really going on in the threat landscape, there is a very, very big gap between what antivirus does and the threats that are being delivered today.” He later continues, ” attackers are not necessarily only targeting the web browser. Think about all the plug-ins you have installed on your machine – RealPlayer, Flash, QuickTime – all of these have vulnerabilities too.” Yes, the threats we face on the Internet have changed over the years and In some respects, Hall is correct. Like many of you, I no longer rely only on AV software. It’s a starting point in keeping my systems protected. I also use a firewall, OpenDNS or a hosts file blocker , and browser addons like NoScript and NoFlash. For added protection, I’ll use Sandboxie (and sometimes Windows SteadyState )

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Symantec’s Hall says free antivirus is for chumps

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