Free Anti-Virus / Spyware/Malware Protection For Your PC

Did you know that there are many excellent anti-virus programs available at no cost that work together to protect your PC from attacks?

A friend of mine and her co-worker, who work in government security, came up with a list of  FREE Anti-Virus products to protect your PC from all the sophisticated viruses, spyware, and malware that are constantly evolving and making trouble for us all.

Unfortunately, because they are FREE, you will need them all.

No one of them is good enough by itself.

Free Protection for Your PC

1. Malwarebytes.  Anti-spyware.  Whether you know it or not your computer is always at risk of becoming infected with viruses, worms, trojans, rootkits, dialers, spyware, and malware. Only the most sophisticated anti-malware techniques can detect and remove these malicious programs from your computer.
2. Spybot.  Spybot – Search & amp; Destroy detects and removes spyware, a relatively new kind of threat not yet covered by common anti-virus applications. If you see new toolbars in your Internet Explorer that you haven’t intentionally installed, if your browser crashes inexplicably, or if your home page has been “hijacked” (or changed without your knowledge), your computer is most probably infected with spyware. Even if you don’t see the symptoms, your computer may be infected, because more and more spyware is emerging. Spybot-S&D is free, so there’s no harm giving it a try to see if something has invaded your computer.
3. AVG.  Basic protection for surfing, searching and social networking.  Millions of people around the world use AVG Anti-Virus Free for their basic online activities. Whether it’s surfing the Internet, conducting web searches, or simply keeping up with friends on Facebook, AVG Anti-Virus Free has got you covered.
4. Microsoft Security Essentials.  Microsoft Security Essentials is a new, free consumer anti-malware solution for your computer. It helps protect against viruses, spyware, and other malicious software. It’s available as a no-cost download for Windows XP SP2 and higher, Windows Vista, and Windows 7.
5.  

Remember, all of these programs are FREE protection for your PC. Don’t sign up for anything that charges a fee unless you are making a conscious decision to do so.

Set these programs to update automatically if you can.  Some of them don’t have that option unless you update (for a fee).  On Windows Vista and Windows 7, Spybot-S&D might tell you that you are not authorized to perform some actions, since they require “Administrator” rights.

You can solve this problem as follows:

1. Right-click the Spybot-Search&Destroy entry in your start menu, instead of left-clicking to start it.
2. Choose Run as administrator from the context menu.

Run these programs regularly, ONE AT A TIME, and you’ll be ready to go.

Sure, there’s work involved, but far less than it would take to correct things once they go wrong.

I hope you find this information useful.

As always, thanks for stopping by,