2012-04-16: New results have been published for:
BullGuard Internet Security 12.0.218
FortKnox Personal Firewall 8.0.205.0
Kaspersky Internet Security 2012 12.0.0.374
Webroot SecureAnywhere Complete 2012 8.0.1.165
The very same version of Kaspersky Internet Security 2012 was tested almost a year ago (on 20th June 2011) in former Proactive Security Challenge (tests were performed on 32-bit Windows XP platform) and its results were excellent, over 90 %. On 64-bit Windows 7 platform that is used for Proactive Security Challenge 64, the results of Kaspersky Internet Security 2012 are much worse – exactly 28 %. This difference is significant but it confirms the trend we have experienced since upgrading to 64-bit Windows 7 platform. The security software vendors do have serious troubles implementing same level of security here. However, the case of Kaspesrky Internet Security is little more complex. As we can see no major update has been done for almost a year to Kaspersky Internet Security 2012, but its vendor has been working on a new version called Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 and have already asked us to privately test it under Proactive Security Challenge 64's methodology. Since Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 is still in the beta stage, the rules of our project do not allow its results to be published, but we can confirm that the results of privately tested Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 Beta were close to the results of the 2012 version on 32-bit Windows XP platform. The fans of Kaspersky Internet Security should not be worried too much since the upcoming version 2013 is expected to rescue the currently lost positions again.
Another drop in score is the case of Webroot. Today's score of Webroot SecureAnywhere Complete is as low as 6 %, which is a position deeply in the red zone. Webroot products used to work on Privatefirewall engine, but it seems that this cooperation has been ended. The architecture of Webroot products have been changed. They are now based on a thin client and the whole protection has been moved to the cloud. The client implements only very basic self-defense features and does not otherwise protect the host computer. This means that Webroot relies heavily on its antivirus detection and any new and undetected malware can have it as an easy target.
FortKnox Personal Firewall with 5 % and BullGuard Internet Security with 3 % confirm their long term position among the worst in our challenge. Hence their results are not surprising.
