Auto Renew Antivirus

[Stellar]

When I bought my new laptop it came with free McAfee Antivirus.  Now that the year is up, McAfee want to auto renew for heaps more than you can buy it in the shops or on the internet.  Fortunately they don't have my banking details or they would just take that money from my account automatically.

I know I can go and change the settings so they can't auto renew - but at the moment I'm not sure what antivirus I will go with.  Have to make my mind up soon though.  The only problem I've found in the past with Norton is that it tends to slow down the computer because it's always doing something.  

[Gort]

Feb 11, 2021 11:51:23 GMT 10 Stellar said:

When I bought my new laptop it came with free McAfee Antivirus.  Now that the year is up, McAfee want to auto renew for heaps more than you can buy it in the shops or on the internet.  Fortunately they don't have my banking details or they would just take that money from my account automatically.

I know I can go and change the settings so they can't auto renew - but at the moment I'm not sure what antivirus I will go with.  Have to make my mind up soon though.  The only problem I've found in the past with Norton is that it tends to slow down the computer because it's always doing something.  

Stellar, I used to run Norton Anti-virus (did so for many years) up until they made it compulsory to auto-renew but leaving the option to cancel afterwards. Yeah, right.


Anyhoo ... IMHO if you are running Windows 10 - their built-in anti-virus package is now as good as the other mobs.

I have dumped Norton and have been going with Windows built-in security for months now with no issues.


p.s.

That's for virus protection, but for malware protection I find MalwareBytes to be very good.

So now I run the free version of MalwareBytes in order to cover that and the free Windows built-in security for virus protection.

So far, so good.

[matte]

I agree, Microsoft Windows Defender is quite adequate for personal use and it doesn't get in the way like McAfee or Norton.

I also recommend using a VPN due to the government wanting to monitor everything we do online and collect the browsing history of its citizens. It shouldn't be their business if we go on websites such as Parler, Gab or any of the other freedom of speech platforms. 

[Stellar]

Thanks guys.

Gort .... I think you'd need the paid version of MalwareBytes, wouldn't you?

Matte .... that's really worrying that govts and crims can follow you around the net and watch your every move. But VPNs don't come cheap!

Basically I am concerned about online banking seeing as we all have to do it these days. In a way I miss the personal
service we used to get at the bank or post office.



ps ... my neighbour used to work for IBM. She's so paranoid these days about what can happen to your data and hackers and whatever, she won't even have a computer!

[Gort]

Feb 12, 2021 9:19:15 GMT 10 Stellar said:

Thanks guys.

Gort .... I think you'd need the paid version of MalwareBytes, wouldn't you?

Matte .... that's really worrying that govts and crims can follow you around the net and watch your every move. But VPNs don't come cheap!

Basically I am concerned about online banking seeing as we all have to do it these days. In a way I miss the personal
service we used to get at the bank or post office.



ps ... my neighbour used to work for IBM. She's so paranoid these days about what can happen to your data and hackers and whatever, she won't even have a computer!

You would need the paid version of Malwarebytes if you wanted continuous protection, but I just run the free one from time to time to check for and remove malware if any.

The Windows Security in-built one is a continual virus protection scanner.


As for a VPN ... I use Surfshark

surfshark.com/

About $77 a year on a 24 month contract to start with which gives you a discount.


p.s.

I worked for IBM for many years too. "Crunching entities"

Until they sold off an entire department to India to pay the workers 20% of what they were paying us.

Funny thing is, after the Indians had taken over the roles ... they all pissed off to Infosys instead so IBM lost a major contract.

[Stellar]

Thanks for that ... so moving on .... another question.  Because this laptop came with free McAfee installed, does that mean that Windows antivirus is not running?  Do I have to turn it on when McAfee expires?

Do you know if Trend Micro is worth buying?  It's $49 in JBHiFi but you can buy it much cheaper on the internet.  It's for malware and ransomeware.  

[Gort]

I don't know about Trend Micro. A quick look around came back with some reports that it is very similar to Norton and effective.


As for McAfee expiring, you may need to turn on Windows security (it might be possible to have both running until McAfee expires, although sometimes these things "clash") ... or you could uninstall McAfee and I think Windows will automatically ask you to turn on Windows Security as it will become aware that your current anti-virus software is no longer active.

To check your current settings, you might see that McAfee shows up under Windows security settings as being a "third party" software currently performing your anti-virus protection.


If you were to uninstall McAfee, then you can make sure Windows Security is turned on by checking the settings:

e.g.

[Stellar]

I'd already checked that thanks. But the only thing I was supposed to do was action needed for Accounts - set up Windows Hello for faster, more secure sign in.

I might go with Windows Security but have Trend Micro anti malware and anti ransomware at $49 per year.  You can buy it in JBHIFi so they don't get your banking details.  I can see that everything is auto renew these days and McAfee actually take your money out of your bank account up to 45 days before you actually need to renew!  And at 2 or 3 times higher than you can buy it elsewhere!