Tips for securing Windows 7 against viruses and Malware

I have learnt over time that the anti-virus business is made over the frustration and fear of the average users. I have a Windows 7 system installed and really happy with the super fast and slick performance. I think Mac is the safest it is out there against viruses, and I don’t think anyone can put infect a Mac with viruses. And now Windows 7 built on Unix is also providing great in-built security. So I want to know about the native protection offered by my Windows, are they comparable to Mac’s system?

I do think Windows 7 is more secure than previous versions, certainly. But if you are thinking of just depending on its native support rather than buying a antivirus, I think it will be a mistake. I think the biggest risk these days is you getting malware accidently from websites and Internet, rather than something which is worming in the computer automatically. So, if you access Internet than malware protection is absolutely important. Yes you can use User Account Controls in Windows 7 but they are a bit cumbersome to use and I have disabled it. SO, you will need a protection against this malwares.

Having a real-time virus scanner is absolutely necessary now. Today’s processors are so powerful; with bigger RAM that you can have a background thread running to check on the application and Internet so that the viruses are deleted immediately before they affect anything on the PC. So, you should have a real time antivirus which won’t affect the performance of the computer which is resource-friendly and is optimized to work well with other threads.

Yes, since the advent of these real time scans I have stopped scheduling my anti virus for full scan of the PC. Since they detect any malicious act immediately and there is no chance it will affect others. If you do feel anything amiss though you should try having a full scan.

I do think that having MSE (Microsoft Security Essentials) is enough in windows 7. And User Account Control is not that annoying as the Vista version. Vista used to prompt you for every little thing, now it does only if it changes anything on your system or something is suspicious. So, if you keep this feature, it will make your surfing on the Internet more safer. So, just having MSE is good, and you don’t have to use this anti virus subscriptions which are not that necessary for an average user.

What I like about MSE is that they are free and there is no Paid version available on the Internet. I used to like the free versions of other anti virus like avg. AVG was a powerful antivirus, which was very robust, low resource hogging but their constant spams and in your face advertising to upgrade to paid version had annoyed me. All the other free versions also have the same thing, so I like MSE which has no paid version till now for them to advertise about.

A warning though, when you install I think it turns off Windows Defender. I think all of you should turn on Windows Defender as it has firewall settings which are very important if you want your computer safe from hacking and stuff. Though MSE does perfect job but still it’s better to have Windows Defender on too.

I have not been using MSE as it is new to the market, and not sure whether it will do a nice job at it. I will wait and see how it pans out and then think about installing it. I think the kind of security software depends upon what level you want from it. So, the AV suites like Norton, McAfee use up too much memory and resources as they are bloat ware and try to please everybody by having loads of features installed, which might not be necessary for all of them. I don’t use AVG other. UI use Avast free version on my PC and also enabled Windows Defender for the firewall which is necessary for a networked computer.

The best way to prevent your computer from viruses is being safe yourselves. Don’t click on unknown unprotected links, download suspicious attachments and applications. Don’t use pirated softwares like Limewire etc. actually you save so much money if you buy music and softwares legally instead of using pirated untrusted ones from the Internet.