Posted by Virus Bulletin on Aug 22, 2007
Top four beat 99% in large collection scan.
Testers at AV-Test.org have run 29 products over a massive collection of malware samples, with detection rates measured against 874,822 items including worms, trojans, bots and backdoors. The top two were multi-engine products, with GDATA's AntiVirusKit ranked number one with 99.88% detection, and the Webwasher gateway product a close second with 99.86%.
Close behind came BitDefender, with 99.51%, and Avira's AntiVir, on 99.29%, showing that single-engine products can also keep up with the amount of malware being pumped out by cybercriminals around the globe. Kaspersky came in fifth with 98.86%.
Also scoring over 90% were products from F-Secure, Alwil, Grisoft, Symantec, Microsoft, Ikarus, Sophos, ESET, Fortinet, McAfee, Dr Web, Rising and Panda. In the 80-90% range came Trend Micro, VBA32, F-Prot, Norman, Authentium and VirusBuster, with CAT QuickHeal, open-source ClamAV, CA's eTrust, Ewido anti-spyware scanner and eSafe gateway product bringing up the rear with 70-80%.
Microsoft was commended for the improvement in its detection rate, up 10% on its previous performance, which is put down to an aggressive hiring policy targeting top experts from across the industry - the latest recruit is former Virus Bulletin technical editor Jakub Kaminski, previously with CA in Australia.
The testers also measured the size of the virus databases used, finding a wide diversity from the smallest, ESET's Nod32 with 8.7MB and Dr Web with 8.9MB, to the biggest, Symantec's 40.2MB, Fortinet's 51.9MB, Trend Micro's 67.2MB and eSafe's enormous 91.4MB. Reasons for the large databases include not compressing the data, for extra speed, and including detailed disinfection routines for specific items and infestations.
AV-Test's vast testset includes only validated items reported in the last six months. The researchers stress that their results are only a snapshot of detection rates at a specific moment in time, and that results of a range of tests should be taken together to give a more accurate picture of the protection offered by a product. Users are also advised to practise safe computing, keeping software patched and exercising caution on the web, rather than relying entirely on security software.
All products tested were the latest home-user or small business versions from each vendor. Testing consisted of an on-demand scan of the test collection with the best possible detection settings enabled, although some products may offer additional protection such as behavioural monitoring, intrusion detection etc. More information on the testing is available at AV-test.org, with detailed papers on the company's testing techniques here.
Representatives of AV-Test will be presenting two new papers at the VB2007 conference, taking place next month in Vienna, Austria. Andreas Marx and Frank Dessman will present 'The WildList is dead, long live the WildList!', while Tom Brosch and Maik Morgenstern will discuss 'Malware removal - beyond content and context scanning'. Details of the conference are here and registration information is here. A discount is available for VB subscribers.
Posted on 22 August 2007 by Virus Bulletin
