Avast for Mac Beta

[jamescv7]

We're glad to announce a new major version of "avast! Free Antivirus for Mac". The current popularity of Apple products also makes them more interesting for the bad guys so we thought it would be good to prepare for the battle sooner rather than later. The new version has been almost totally reworked compared with our previous solution for the Mac OS.

We're kicking off with three shields and an on-demand scan. The Web Shield together with the Mail Shield will check the vast majority of incoming data from the Internet. avast! Free Antivirus for Mac is also equipped with a File Shield, which scans all programs stored and executed from your hard drive. Everything is packed in a brand new GUI and is now available as a public beta.

Features:

On-demand scanning: It's possible to scan the whole file system, network volumes or a mounted removable volume. You can also run a custom scan. Scan reports are automatically archived and are accessible from the GUI at anytime.
On-screen alerts: Alert messages are displayed on-screen whenever a threat is detected.
File Shield: The File Shield scans the binaries of started applications and all files at the time they are modified.
Web Shield: The Web Shield monitors and filters all HTTP traffic coming from web sites on the Internet. Connections from your web browser are redirected to the Web Shield module. The Web Shield in turn connects to the requested web server and while downloading the content, it simultaneously scans it for viruses and Trojans. Only clean data is delivered to the browser, all malware is stopped before it gets saved on your Mac.
Mail Shield: The Mail Shield monitors and filters all POP3 and IMAP traffic coming from mail servers on the internet. It does not prevent saving of infected files (doing so could lead to irreversible data loss), it just detects them. The File Shield prevents any infected attachments from causing harm to your system.
Automatic updates: The scanning engine is automatically updated with our regular VPS database updates.


Known Issues:

Drag and drop functionality on the Dock icon is not available when the GUI is not running.
Some of the avast! windows aren't automatically activated during application start-up and may be hidden behind other application windows.
Sometimes Apple's default icon is shown in the Dock and Finder instead of the avast! icon.
The Growl framework (http://growl.info) is necessary for the pop-up alert functionality. We recommend installing Growl before installing avast!
Some items in the menus and some buttons in the GUI are greyed out / disabled as their functionality is not yet fully implemented.


Installation & Uninstallation:

To use the Mail Shield, you need to disable encrypted POP3/IMAP connections in your email client's settings so the traffic can be scanned. By default, the Mail Shield encrypts all outgoing traffic itself if the mail server supports it (encrypted connections can be forced for selected mail accounts in the Mail Shield settings).
Uninstallation must be carried out from the application's menu bar - item "Uninstall avast!"

Link

 

[Dejan]

Sounds nice, I think it'll really be useful considering the recent rogues that came out for Mac (and that Apple doesn't want to move a finger about it).

 

[Tom172]

I'm glad to see this surge of AV's for Mac. Apple throughout the years has kept changing there statements about Mac OS and viruses. (Paraphrasing) "Macs are Immune to viruses and malware".....Then "There are significally less viruses for Mac than Windows". Apple knew it was going to happen eventually, but didn't act and gave out a false sense of security to customers.

 

[Jack]

Seems like MAC is slowly but certainly becoming a Windows. :lolz:
Although Apple has finally accepted that there is a malware problem even for their OS and published a knowledge base article on how to remove MAC Defender ...they still don't recommend anywhere to their users to run an antivirus......
As a fact ZDNet recently estimated that between 60,000 and 125,000 Mac users were affected by MAC Defender..


BTW ..... another Windows tool which will be available for MAC.

CCleaner for Mac

Great news for Apple Mac owners out there. CCleaner for Mac will be released as a public beta version for everyone to download in the next few days!
Support for other operating systems and hardware is one of the most frequent questions we get emailed about. So we're starting out first with a Mac version.
Stay tuned to our Mac website at www.piriform.com/mac for download and update details as they become available.

 

[win7holic]

Seems like MAC is slowly but certainly becoming a Windows. :lolz:

I agree with you
Can get infected and now seems that it also needs to be cleaned.

 

[LoftedAphid86]

Now they need a real time Avast for Linux.
Why do they never care for me in real time?

 

[Ink]

I took time to install this and have some screen-shots for you.

 

[Guest28]

FYI.......... it's still using 4.8 old signatures.

 

[Ink]

From reply #7:

The current beta is indeed still based on the v4.8 engine, but this will be changed before the official release. Plus, the detection rates of Mac malware is the same between avast 4/5/6 engines. The main point of the beta is to test features like the shields, which should be fully functional.

Thanks
Vlk

http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=78646.msg649597#msg649597

At least they planning to upgrade to the newer engine.

 

[LoftedAphid86]

Can we see the warning message?
Eicar?

 

[moonshine]

Nice to see that more Free AVs are being released for Mac. +2!

 

[McLovin]

It is much better that people are starting to make antivirus software for Macs. I have a friend that says "ahh...it is alright it is a mac I don't need antivirus" but they do..

 

[win7holic]

thx storm for sharing.

 

[jamescv7]

Well good that engine on avast will change when it released on final version. GUI makes it a friendly same like in Windows.

 

[Ink]

CHANGELOG:

refresh 02/27/2012:
- changes in GUI:
* New scan type: Local Volume Scan
* Redesign of the status screen.
* Added new page for management of WebRep browser plug-ins.
- WebRep (new feature):
* Web reputation plug-ins for web browsers (Safari, Firefox, Chrome are supported).
- Other:
* Many bug fixes and minor enhancements almost everywhere.

Other updates/changes in link below:
http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=78646.msg649332#msg649332

 

[jamescv7]

CHANGELOG:

refresh 03/22/2012 (build 36454):
- Program update capability (so this should be your last manual update!)
- Huge amount of bug fixes and minor enhancements everywhere.

http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=78646.0

 

[Jack]

Ok..ok.. I'll ask... how many signature for MAC malware it has .... rankster:

 

[Ink]

Don't forget there are cross-platform exploits in Java and Flash etc.

 

[Gnosis]

It is too bad that money talks. Otherwise we could continue to see MAC users suffer while being so haughty and high minded. I have nothing against the late, great Steve Jobs--only some of his ignorant customers.