If you have worked with computers at all, you have probably heard of computer viruses. But, do you know what viruses are, and how you can protect yourself against them? Viruses are “bugs” that are passed from one computer to another, and can be very destructive to your hard drive. In fact, they can erase your entire hard drive for time and all eternity. To protect your computer from viruses, you must install anti-virus software. If you don’t have anti-virus software, it isn’t going to be a matter of “if” you get a virus but “when” you will get one.
Fortunately, it is easy to download anti-virus software from the Internet. There are even a number of free programs and free offers on commercial programs that you can take advantage of. If you are looking for a good free anti-virus program, you might want to check out those offered by AntiVir Personal Edition. You can find out about these programs, and download one onto your computer by going to Avira Antivir. You can click on the “downloads” button right from this website and download an anti-virus program in just a few minutes. These programs have a high rating for catching in-the-wild viruses, zoo viruses, and compressed viruses. What’s more, the programs don’t give many “false positives”. This mean the programs catch the real viruses and don’t waste a lot of your time catching things that aren’t real.
Another way that you might get free anti-virus software is by going to a site that offers links to a wide variety of software. One of these sites is The Free Site. From this site, you can download regular anti-virus software, or you can do a scan of your computer to see if you already have any viruses or questionable files. If you do have a virus, you may be able to use this site to remove the virus from your computer.
If you are on a computer that is protected, you might want to surf around a little and find out about the various programs available. Just type free antivirus software into your favorite search engine, and you will quickly find out just how much is available and just how easy it is to download free anti-virus programs.
There are a couple of things to remember when you are using free anti-virus software. One thing to remember is that you are reasonably well protected against viruses but poorly protected against other kinds of malware such as adware or spyware. To protect yourself against adware and spyware, you will need to find a program that is geared towards protecting you from these things. The most popular free anti-virus programs pick up less than half of the adware and spyware attacks on your computer.
Another thing to remember when using free anti-virus programs is to update the programs regularly. Some programs, such as AVG, will include free monthly updates. For other programs, you might need to reinstall the programs regularly or accept the updates when they popup on your computer screen. When you are getting ready to download the program of your choice, check and find out how the updates are available. If there are no updates available, you might want to choose another program.
Once you have the software on your computer, you might want to check and see how your computer fares in a test of your protection. If you go to thefreesite.com you will see a link titled “PC Security Test”. This free program will check your computer’s ability to detect and kill all kinds of attacks, including those from spyware and even hackers.