All you need to know about Antivirus

An antivirus is a software that protects our system from malware like viruses, trojans, backdoors, etc. To prevent our computers from this malware, antiviruses are installed. This also protects our data from getting leaked and provides email protection, browsing protection, and much more.

There are many Antivirus, but the most powerful Antivirus are:

• ESET NOD32 Antivirus
• Norton Antivirus
• Avast Antivirus
• Kaspersky Antivirus
• F-secure Antivirus

How Antivirus detects Malware?

Every file has a signature, it tells how the file works and behaves. Antivirus scans that signature and checks in their database which contains a huge database of malware signatures. If the Antivirus has that signature on its database, then it will detect the malware and remove it from the computer.

But what if this is new malware and the database does not have a signature? Then Antivirus will send the sample of the file to its lab or run directly in a Virtual Environment to check the behaviour of the file if there is something suspicious or wrong the file’s signature will be added to their database and it will be detected as a virus. That is why it is necessary to update the Antivirus daily.

If we download a file and scan it with our antivirus and if it is undetected, does that mean it is safe? No, it does not mean that the file is malware-free as it might be the case that the signature of the file is not in the antivirus database. Antivirus can be bypassed with many techniques. So, to overcome these issues you can use an online virus scanner that scans the file using more than 70 antivirus databases.

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Antivirus is based on the following methods:

• Signature-based Detection: It detects malware based on its signature and if the signature matches with its database then the file is deleted if it does not find the file’s signature in its database then takes the signature of that file and sends it to its labs for testing so that they can identify whether it is a malware or not.
• Cloud Detection: It is based on a cloud server and it detects malware with the help of the server. You must install only a small client program that will connect to the security service provider's Web Service. On the bright side, this drastically reduces the processing amount needed to keep a system safe. But on the other hand, there can be connection issues and secondly, there is some concern about uploading user data to the server, which can question your security.
  
• Heuristic Detection: Detecting Viruses by examining code for suspicious properties. Antivirus de-compiles and scan the source code of the program. This code is then compared with viruses (already known) and in a heuristic database. If the particular percentage of code matches with the heuristic database, the code is flagged as a possible threat.
• Sandbox Detection: This type of detection is done via an isolated environment like VMs, and the file is tested in VMs to detect any suspicious behaviour. It is a good practice to run files in VMs or inside sandboxing tools before running them on your main system. Heuristic Detection can also be based on this method. Sandbox detection can be of two types, Standalone and Integrated.
• Behaviour Detection – It detects malware based on its behaviour. Example: If a program is using a larger percentage of memory or if the file tries to make a connection, also known as a reverse connection to an unknown destination, then the antivirus will detect and delete the file.
• Reputation-Based: Reputation-based security is a security mechanism that classifies a file as safe or unsafe based on its worldwide reputation. It works by collecting and tracking several attributes of a file, such as age, source, signature, and overall usage statistics across thousands of users consuming that file. The data is then analyzed within a reputation engine using algorithms and statistical analysis.

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We hope this helps. If any suggestions or doubts you can add a comment and we will reply as soon as possible.