VB100 certification report - December 2018

Martijn Grooten

Virus Bulletin

Copyright © 2018 Virus Bulletin


 

Introduction

Anti-virus has long stopped being the sole layer of defence against malware attacks. Given its more subtle role, it is all the more important that users and organizations can rely on their endpoint solutions to satisfy a minimum standard.

For more than two decades, Virus Bulletin has set a minimum standard for anti-virus (or anti-malware) products, checking whether products live up to expectation and providing those that do with the VB100 'stamp of approval'.

This report details the performance of 29 of such products from 27 different vendors during November and December 2018.

 

The VB100 set-up

In the VB100 test, a copy of the product to be tested is installed on two platforms: Windows 10 and Windows 7. On each platform, and at three different times in the test, the product is asked to scan both the latest version of the WildList1 and a selection of clean files taken from Virus Bulletin's own set of files belonging to widely used legitimate software.

A legitimate file that is blocked at least once is considered a false positive, while a WildList file that isn't blocked is considered a miss.

A product achieves a VB100 certification if:

  • No more than 0.5% of WildList samples are missed

and

  • No more than 0.01% of legitimate files are blocked

For full details, we refer to the VB100 methodology on the Virus Bulletin website: https://www.virusbulletin.com/testing/vb100/vb100-methodology/vb100-methodology-ver1-1/. This test used version 1.1 of the VB100 methodology.

 

Diversity test

The malware part of the VB100 certification uses the WildList, a regularly updated list of extremely well vetted malware samples, guaranteed to have been spotted in the wild multiple times. This makes them very suitable for a certification test like VB100.

The 'Diversity Test' looks at products' detection of another set of recent malware samples, to acknowledge the fact that products detect malware samples beyond a standard set of samples, and provides a measure of that detection.

 

Products & results

Products were allowed to download updates during the course of the test. The version numbers listed in the results that follows refer to those at the start of the test.

 

AhnLab V3 Internet Security 9.0

Windows 7 version 9.0.49.2  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 9.0.50.5 
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000% 
Diversity test rate  100.00%

 

Arcabit AntiVirus

Windows 7 version 2018.11.05  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version  2018.11.06
WildList detection  100.0%
False positive rate 0.000% 
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

Avast Free Antivirus

Windows 7 version 18.7.2354  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 18.7.2354
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 99.49% 

 

AVG Internet Security

Windows 7 version 18.7.3069 12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 18.7.3069
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000% 
Diversity test rate 99.49% 

 

Defenx Security Suite

Windows 7 version 15.1.0112  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 15.1.0112 
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000% 
Diversity test rate 99.69% 

 

Emsisoft Anti-Malware

Windows 7 version 2018.10.0.9018  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 2018.10.0.9018 
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00% 

 

eScan Internet Security Suite for Windows

Windows 7 version 14.0.1400.2029  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 14.0.1400.2029 
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

ESET Internet Security

Windows 7 version 12.0.27.0  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 12.0.27.0 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

ESTsecurity ALYac

Windows 7 version 3.0.1.3  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 3.0.1.3 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

Exosphere Endpoint Protection

Windows 7 version 2.2.0.57  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 2.2.0.57 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.001% 
Diversity test rate 99.90% 

 

Faronics Anti-Virus

Windows 7 version 4.12.3102.401  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 4.12.3102.401 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.008%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

FireEye Endpoint Security

Windows 7 version 27.30.4  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 27.30.4 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000% 
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

Fortinet FortiClient

Windows 7 version 5.6.2.1117  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 5.6.2.1117 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000% 
Diversity test rate 99.90%

 

G DATA Antivirus

Windows 7 version 25.5.0.2  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 25.5.0.2 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate  99.90%

 

IKARUS anti.virus

Windows 7 version 2.19.14  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 2.19.14 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.001%
Diversity test rate 99.90% 

 

K7 Total Security

Windows 7 version 15.1.0345 12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 15.1.0345
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 99.69% 

 

Kaspersky Endpoint Security 10 for Windows

Windows 7 version 11.0.0.6499  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 11.0.0.6499 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

NANO Antivirus

Windows 7 version 1.0.134.89835  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 1.0.134.89835 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 99.90%

 

Rising Security Cloud Client

Windows 7 version 3.0.0.83  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 3.0.1.14
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 65.27%

 

SafeCentral Security Suite

Windows 7 version 2.0.1430  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 2.0.1430 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

TACHYON Endpoint Security

Windows 7 version 5.0.0.57  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 5.0.0.57 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.006% 
Diversity test rate 99.90% 

 

TeamViewer Endpoint Protection

Windows 7 version 1.0.105328  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 1.0.129712 
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

Tencent PC Manager

Windows 7 version 12.3.26589.901  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 12.3.26590.901 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

TotalAV

Windows 7 version 4.9.36 12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 4.9.36
WildList detection 99.8%
False positive rate 0.006%
Diversity test rate 98.36%

 

Total Defense Premium

Windows 7 version 9.0.0.747  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 9.0.0.747 
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

Total Defense Unlimited

Windows 7 version 11.0.0.775  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 11.0.0.775 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

VIPRE Advanced Security

Windows 7 version 11.0.3.20  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 11.0.3.20 
WildList detection 100.0% 
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

VirIT eXplorer PRO

Windows 7 version 8.7.98  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 8.8.0 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 41.19% 

 

Zemana EndPoint Security

Windows 7 version 6.6.4.68  12-18.jpg
Windows 10 version 6.6.4.68 
WildList detection 100.0%
False positive rate 0.000%
Diversity test rate 100.00%

 

Appendix 1: products not certified

Cyren failed to achieve VB100 certification in this test due to a technical issue with the scanner that affected the first testing part; the issue has since been resolved. Cyren told us that only on-access protection was affected, and users would have been protected by other layers of defence.

 

Appendix 2: excluded parts

Technical and other issues can render the data we collect insufficient or otherwise unsuitable for accurate reporting. In such cases, the methodology allows us to discard the affected test part and record the event below. Two healthy test parts out of three are required for the certification to be issued.

No test parts had to be excluded for any product.

 

Appendix 3: sample set sizes

The WildList contained 3,091 samples. The set of clean files used for the false positive test contained 100,000 files, of which 29,071 were portable executable (PE) files. The set used for the Diversity Test contained 976 samples.

 

Footnote

1 The WildList is an extremely well-vetted set of malware recently observed in the wild by researchers: http://www.wildlist.org/.

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