Antivirus is what? Basic concepts

Antiviruses are known for a long time. About these programs, absolutely all people have heard, even distant from computer technology. In principle, speaking in general terms, the antivirus is the key to understanding the security of the entire computer system and the safety of data.

What is an antivirus? General concepts

If we talk about what antivirus software is, then, roughly speaking, this is one application or a set of software designed to protect the system and information from malicious programs, to search for and identify viruses, to remove or treat the infected components of the system in the form of Files or installed applications.

Thus, we can say that an antivirus is software for complex protection of a computer system from external threats that can penetrate it from the Internet, via e-mail or using removable media.

Classification of antiviruses

With regard to classification, antiviruses can be conditionally divided into the intended use and technologies of the analysis, not to mention the operating systems in which they are supposed to function.

In the sense of purpose, an antivirus is either one program for analyzing, detecting or removing malicious codes and applications, or a combined software package capable of not only carrying out the above actions, but also providing comprehensive protection in terms of working on the World Wide Web, receiving and sending e-mails , Protection against spyware, capable of stealing information in the background, when the user does not even know about it, etc. (These are the so-called versions of antiviruses).

The simplest example is two software products such as Eset NOD32 and Eset Smart Security.

The second package has more features and can not only determine the presence of viruses in the system , delete them and treat other files. There is enough powerful functionality even for protecting the computer system and data with constant connection to the Internet, and the program also has a function of "proactive" protection, can create backup copies for recovery, can encrypt data and much more.

An important place in the classification of such software is occupied by the methods of analysis. They are divided into signature and probabilistic.

Signature analysis

The signature method is based on the fact that the anti-virus program compares the structure of suspicious files with those stored in the signature database. That's why we can say that an antivirus is an application that constantly requires updating. As it is already clear, such a methodology does not give a 100-percent security guarantee, because the program is able to determine only the already known virus. Among the simplest programs of this type is Avast, an antivirus that is free.

Probabilistic analysis

As for the analysis of this type, it is divided into heuristic, behavioral and comparative checksums.

In short, in the sense of heuristic analysis, an antivirus is a means of comparing the structure of files based on already known viruses, as well as identifying the algorithms that they use in their work.

Behavioral analysis implies the likelihood of certain actions. For the most part, this applies to executable macros, scripts, or applets. In other words, this technique is able to predict what action can be taken by a suspicious file or application.

Checksum comparison is a method in which file checksums are written to the cache, and then compared with subsequent values. The conclusion about the presence of a threat can be made on the basis of the simultaneous or mass modification of the objects of the system.

As already understood, in almost all methods there is a very conditional definition of the presence of the virus. For example, "Avast" is an antivirus that can take the threat of the execution of some macro-command, while in fact it is not a virus or malicious code. In each method of assessing the probability of a threat, there are pros and cons. But their combination in one software product gives more tangible results, allowing you to identify viruses, malicious codes or spyware based on aggregate analysis.

The most famous antiviruses

As for anti-virus software, now in the world of computer technology there are quite a lot of simple applications and whole multifunctional complexes. Perhaps the most famous software package can be called "Kaspersky Anti-Virus", which currently has the greatest capabilities in comparison with all other products.

True, this package is designed for a sufficiently powerful system in terms of performance, because it gives such a load in the active mode, that low-power computers and laptops will simply "choke" in the process of functioning. However, Kaspersky Anti-Virus has its minimum and recommended system requirements for the computer hardware. So it's not on every computer you will install.

Eset products are also popular. Here, Eset NOD32 and Eset Smart Security systems, mentioned above, are most needed. It is worth noting that the products of Kaspersky Lab and Eset are paid or shareware, so you will have to pay a round sum for them (of course, provided you use licensed software). It goes without saying that you can also find "cracked" versions on the Internet. That's only guarantees of full functionality can not even give the crackers themselves.

Among free software, many users prefer the same Avast, Panda antivirus, AVG, McAffee, Norton Antivirus, etc. In principle, there are a lot of antivirus software, so each user chooses what to work with and how to protect the system.

Conclusion

Probably, most users already understood that an antivirus is a program for full protection not only from viruses, but also from a variety of third-party threats related to spying or stealing confidential information, in general, from anything that could pose a threat to the operating system , "Hardware" (there are also such viruses) and user files that are stored on a hard drive, removable media or even in a "cloud" storage.