AVAST wins a VB100 award and a free weekend

Dec. 9, 2010 - PRLog -- AVAST wins a VB100 award and a free weekend  

PRAGUE, Czech Republic, December 9, 2010 –  avast! Free Antivirus won another VB100 award for detecting 100 percent of the in-the-wild virus sample, proving that antivirus protection can be free, good – and easy on your weekend “away from the computer” plans.  

Avast got top marks from its performance, starting with the initial installation. “avast! surprised us by arriving as a mere 50MB install package, including all required updates,” wrote John Hawes, team director of Virus Bulletin’s VB100 testing program. “With no reboot required, the whole process was over in less than 30 seconds.”

The positive news continued throughout Hawes’ review: “Despite its free-for-home-use nature, the product includes a pretty thorough range of additional protection layers as would be expected of a fully-fledged security suite.” These free features helped avast! top the overall malware detection rates from a number of paid-for products, including those from McAfee and Kaspersky.

avast! had one of the highest scores of the 64 tested products for its detection of Trojans, beating out Kaspersky and Microsoft Security Essentials. Not all antivirus companies participated, making it impossible to compare results between all competing products in the marketplace. The most notable absence was Norton/Symantec.

But for the VB100 reviewers, the best news about avast! was about their weekend.  “The fact that all tests were complete not long after lunch on the same day they were started brought an additional smile,” quipped Hawes. This was a much faster conclusion than the complete weekend required for Microsoft’s MSE to complete its scans of the VB100 virus samples.


About Virus Bulletin:
Virus Bulletin is a leader in providing independent commentary on computer security issues. The VB100 test published in their December 2010 issue analyzed 64 antivirus programs on identical systems with AMD Phenom II X2 550 processors, 4 GB RAM, dual 80GB and 1TB hard drives, running Microsoft Windows 7 Professional, 32-bit edition. For more information, go to www.virusbtn.com.


About AVAST Software
AVAST Software (www.avast.com) protects over 130 million registered users in virtually every country and territory in the world with its avast! antivirus program. avast! Free Antivirus sets the standard as a free, full-featured computer security application that matches or exceeds the performance of other paid products. The avast! 5.0 portfolio includes Free Antivirus, Pro Antivirus for customized protection, and the premium Internet Security with its no-hassle Silent Firewall. Anchored by the CommunityIQ network of sensors for reporting on-line threats and supported by multiple protective shields, avast! performance has been certified by VB100, ICSA Labs, and West Coast Labs. Available in over 30 languages, avast! provides global protection for homes and businesses.  


Contact
Lyle Frink
phone: +420-274-005-787
e-mail: frink@avast.com