Best Paid AV Security 2023

[ForgottenSeer 98186]

Now, let's hear what MT members have to say regarding their analysis and opinion about the best paid internet security software.

The answer to "What is best AV?" is highly subjective and personal. The reasons people choose certain software runs from geopolitical to varying degrees of paranoia to just liking the GUI.

Jedem das Seine. To Each His Own.

My criteria is extremely light on resources, stable, reliable and highly compatible with Windows. That leaves basically F-Secure. A plus with F-Secure is there are never troubles with Core Isolation, I can still use MS Defender Exploit Protection, and other Windows protections. No problems with Visual Studio Code and its output. No problems using PowerShell. I can still enable MS Defender for periodic scans (hardened to MAX with Configure Defender)... and it all just works together for a nice user experience.

Spoiler: F-Secure

Caveat: F-Secure is not the greatest protection against malicious scripts. For a paranoid user they should block commonly used sponsors, scripts or create sponsor block firewall rules.

In the last 10 years I have not heard of any relative, friend or distant acquaintance complained of being infected, while I know that at least two of my friends owning an company have been attacked (one website hack and one partly successfull ransomware infection).

Friends that are unmanaged home users - I gave them Chromebooks as presents. The few times I did look at their Windows laptops, each one was infested with PUA\PUPs.

Friends that are in the IT industry, have not heard a single complaint about an infection in decades.

Businesses - it is my business to deal with infected businesses daily.

I do not recall any regular MT members except for the recent self-admission of an "almost infected" resulting from a software download from Youtube.

There once was a semi-regular MT member - 2 or 3 years after ransomware really hit it big - that was the type to search the internet for and download PDFs for "study & research." They did that once too often. ESET did not detect it as ransomware and upon opening the PDF (obfuscated .exe) all their files were encrypted. This included their PhD work product. They had no backups.

I don't take a lot of notice of comparative sites to be honest, out of all AV's I use F-Secure, I can't say how effective it is as I've not had in infection for use a least 20 years & that was a worm - F-Secure is stable & simplistic I would also stick Emsisoft & ESET on my list too, I've never had issues with either of those.

This is one of the appeals of F-Secure. It cannot be tweaked, but unless you are a prolific, wonton downloader who has no regard for security, it will do a good job

 

[ShenguiTurmi]

These are Endpoint versions for businesses or home use too?

its for business, but if you want, you can use it at home, even more convenient than home products.

This is the console of crowdstrike. Let me give you an example. You just need to set a few sensitivity options. Enterprise products are not as complex as you think (provided that you don't use EDR, only use it as AV).
As for false positives, they will help you deal with them most of the time, which is the service brought by higher prices

 

[[correlate]]

These are Endpoint versions for businesses or home use too?

For personal and corporate use
Crowdstrike Falcon
cylance protect
The others are for companies only

 

[[correlate]]

its for business, but if you want, you can use it at home, even more convenient than home products.

View attachment 273588
This is the console of crowdstrike. Let me give you an example. You just need to set a few sensitivity options. Enterprise products are not as complex as you think (provided that you don't use EDR, only use it as AV).
As for false positives, they will help you deal with them most of the time, which is the service brought by higher prices

You have a good briefing on the endpoints

 

[likeastar20]

@ShenguiTurmi how much are you paying for S1?

 

[Trooper]

its for business, but if you want, you can use it at home, even more convenient than home products.

View attachment 273588
This is the console of crowdstrike. Let me give you an example. You just need to set a few sensitivity options. Enterprise products are not as complex as you think (provided that you don't use EDR, only use it as AV).
As for false positives, they will help you deal with them most of the time, which is the service brought by higher prices

How does Crowdstrike compare to Sentinel One? Currently looking into both at work. Cheers.

 

[Nikos751]

The answer to "What is best AV?" is highly subjective and personal. The reasons people choose certain software runs from geopolitical to varying degrees of paranoia to just liking the GUI.

Jedem das Seine. To Each His Own.

My criteria is extremely light on resources, stable, reliable and highly compatible with Windows. That leaves basically F-Secure. A plus with F-Secure is there are never troubles with Core Isolation, I can still use MS Defender Exploit Protection, and other Windows protections. No problems with Visual Studio Code and its output. No problems using PowerShell. I can still enable MS Defender for periodic scans (hardened to MAX with Configure Defender)... and it all just works together for a nice user experience.

Spoiler: F-Secure

View attachment 273583

Caveat: F-Secure is not the greatest protection against malicious scripts. For a paranoid user they should block commonly used sponsors, scripts or create sponsor block firewall rules.


Friends that are unmanaged home users - I gave them Chromebooks as presents. The few times I did look at their Windows laptops, each one was infested with PUA\PUPs.

Friends that are in the IT industry, have not heard a single complaint about an infection in decades.

Businesses - it is my business to deal with infected businesses daily.

I do not recall any regular MT members except for the recent self-admission of an "almost infected" resulting from a software download from Youtube.

There once was a semi-regular MT member - 2 or 3 years after ransomware really hit it big - that was the type to search the internet for and download PDFs for "study & research." They did that once too often. ESET did not detect it as ransomware and upon opening the PDF (obfuscated .exe) all their files were encrypted. This included their PhD work product. They had no backups.


This is one of the appeals of F-Secure. It cannot be tweaked, but unless you are a prolific, wonton downloader who has no regard for security, it will do a good job

Whats your business experience with recent Norton?

 

[micasayyo]

The best security will surely be Bitdefender or Kaspersky, but in my case I use Eset (by the way, my company also uses it)

 

[Ink]

The best security will surely be Bitdefender or Kaspersky, but in my case I use Eset (by the way, my company also uses it)

You chose not to use the best? Why Eset?

In terms of best, what makes Bitdefender and Kaspersky better than the rest?

 

[micasayyo]

You chose not to use the best? Why Eset?

In terms of best, what makes Bitdefender and Kaspersky better than the rest?

On several computers that I have in the family, I had Eset installed on 2 computers, Kaspersky on 1 computer and Bitdefender on another, but for the past 1 year I have been using Eset on all of them, why Eset? Simply because it is the one that gives me the least trouble.

Bitdefender by score in the AV tests is one of those with the best score, I have been using it for many years even when they called it Bugdefender in this forum but lately it deleted a file even though I had it in exclusions so I stopped using it.

Kaspersky just didn't use it for the political reasons we already know.
all the best

 

[Sorrento]

I must say reading this thread that to me the GUI is quite important & I really don't like paying out cash for decent PC parts to have the PC slowed down & fans running faster by a AV that maybe is marginally better (maybe) I dislike Bitdefender greatly GUI & the latest Kaspersky that's far to busy for me & seems to be a report generating program. Give me simplicity any day -. So it's ESET, F-Secure or Emsisoft.

 

[robboman]

For a paid product I would go with Kaspersky, always provided very solid protection.

 

[Islam Gamal]

For me Norton and Trend Micro are the ones I like most among all the options.

 

[Maschera]

I use Bitdefender on my work computer and GDATA on my personal computer, and I am extremely satisfied with both products. Especially GDATA is a product that I recommend and endorse.

 

[SillyBilly299]

IMO, Bitdefender and Kaspersky have always been the top 2 best antivirus options for personal use in term of security, but those two feel too heavy on my laptop for some reason. Currently, I'm using Eset because it is much lighter, offers adequate protection, and is one of the cheapest antivirus options in my country (less than $12 a year for the internet security version). Also, I'd rather have better performance, since I have common sense and avoid shady websites.

 

[a090]

“Best” is subjective. There is only best for you, not best overall. Any AV (or most of them at least) can be super aggressive, but then the system will be unstable with a plethora of false positives. The trick isn’t simply catching the malware, the trick is catching it without disrupting a user’s day to day flow. Protecting the user while staying out of the way.

All that being said, the product with the best balance between protection and ease of use is currently Kaspersky, imho. Hands down. The runner-up would be BitDefender, but I would categorize Big K as being head and shoulders above BitDefender. If you’re not worried about Russian software and are OK with the “aggressive” techniques Big K employs to keep you safe, I say go for it. Just set it up recently for my pops on his PC and he’s a fan.

Me personally, I use F-Secure on my own system. It’s a lightweight product with solid protection, no noticeable system impact, extremely compatible with built-in protections in W11 (Kaspersky is more of a “my way or the highway” and is incompatible with and/or disables some Windows protections, and enables its own instead), and works well with the other products in my security apparatus.

I’m a cautious user, so a product that does a good job while staying out if my way is more important to me than the absolute best protection on the planet. For that reason, F-Secure is my boy. But Big K has been serving my pops well so far, and has a nice interface and a bunch of tweakable settings.

 

[Evjl's Rain]

I vote for Kaspersky
I honestly think we should not use any paid AV because most of them are not better or even worse than the top free AVs, especially Kaspersky free or Bitdefender free

save your money for other things

 

[RansomwareRemediation]

for me Bitdefender is the best engine at the moment.
Second Kaspersky - Norton
3. Avast