enjay Posted October 14, 2011 Posted October 14, 2011 What are people's thoughts on anti-virus on mobiles? Worth getting or not??
featured_spectre Posted October 14, 2011 Posted October 14, 2011 If you can get it bundled in with your home AV or work AV then why not, otherwise I have yet to see anything that requires me to use an AV on my phone
elsiegee40 Posted October 14, 2011 Posted October 14, 2011 At the moment there isn't that much of a problem, but then there wasn't much of a problem with PCs 10 years ago. Things are changing rapidly and I think phone AV will become essential in the next couple of years
tech_guy Posted October 14, 2011 Posted October 14, 2011 I have Lookout on my HTC Desire. Not essential just yet but trust me a delving into some of the darker areas of the net turns up what we shall be facing in the not too distant future as more and more of us use our phones to make epayments. There's some pretty scary stuff being cooked up.
enjay Posted October 14, 2011 Author Posted October 14, 2011 Okay, so which product(s) would people recommend? I'm happy to pay for the right one, if need be.
enjay Posted October 14, 2011 Author Posted October 14, 2011 otherwise I have yet to see anything that requires me to use an AV on my phone So, you'd advocate me waiting until after my phone has been bricked/my details stolen by a virus before getting protection? :-)
elsiegee40 Posted October 14, 2011 Posted October 14, 2011 Okay, so which product(s) would people recommend? I'm happy to pay for the right one, if need be. Oh come on now... you're on tech forum. What's your phone? We can't recommend without knowing the OS!
enjay Posted October 14, 2011 Author Posted October 14, 2011 Lookout is free. Is it any good, or do you get what you pay for, as it were?
enjay Posted October 14, 2011 Author Posted October 14, 2011 Oh come on now... you're on tech forum. What's your phone? We can't recommend without knowing the OS! Ha, fair point - HTC Sensation, running Android 2.3
tech_guy Posted October 14, 2011 Posted October 14, 2011 It seems to do what it claims to and it was highly rated on some of the droid forums: https://www.mylookout.com/
enjay Posted October 14, 2011 Author Posted October 14, 2011 Thanks, I'll give Lookout a try. Don't think I'll bother with the premium one just yet, as I hardly ever browse unknown sites, but the malware scanning of the free one sounds like a good idea.
Arthur Posted October 14, 2011 Posted October 14, 2011 What are people's thoughts on anti-virus on mobiles? Worth getting or not? Non-jailbroken iPhones and Windows Phones do not get viruses, so your question only really applies to Android smartphones.
aerospacemango Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 Just seen this thread, so I'd like to throw in another vote for mylookout. Had it on both my phones since the day I got them. Have never had any problems, but it's always worth remembering the old maxim.... Better to be safe than sorry!
Geoff Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 Non-jailbroken iPhones and Windows Phones do not get viruses, so your question only really applies to Android smartphones. Incorrect. There's plenty of unpatched holes that would let a virus in.
sparkeh Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 Non-jailbroken iPhones and Windows Phones do not get viruses, so your question only really applies to Android smartphones. Um, the article you quoted states that there could be viruses for Windows Phones: even with its restrictions, there is the possibility that the platform does attract viruses. Some of these might even use music and image files to propagate. AVG putting the infrastructure in place to scan these files is not entirely unreasonable. On my Android phone I use Lookout which appears to do a good job.
Arthur Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 Um, the article you quoted states that there could be viruses for Windows Phones The first is that Windows Phone simply doesn't have any viruses to scan for. Second, Windows Phone applications are sandboxed; they have no access to the system files or other applications. Even if a virus were to be developed for the platform, the virus scanner would not be able to detect or remove it.
sparkeh Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 @Arthur Ok we could trade carefully selected quoted all day, but the article contradicts itself. If a Windows phone can store files that have malware then people are putting a lot of trust in MS to not have left any vulnerabilities in things like the image viewer or browser right? Anyway, I see AV software as more than just protecting yourself, if I did have some file with malware on my phone I would see it as my duty not to pass it on. 1
aerospacemango Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 @Arthur Ok we could trade carefully selected quoted all day, but the article contradicts itself. If a Windows phone can store files that have malware then people are putting a lot of trust in MS to not have left any vulnerabilities in things like the image viewer or browser right? Anyway, I see AV software as more than just protecting yourself, if I did have some file with malware on my phone I would see it as my duty not to pass it on. Well said, that man! If only everyone had that attitude, instead of the laissez-faire attitude that "It doesn't affect my phone, and probably never will, so i don't need anything!" This same problem affects people with Macs too! (By Macs, I don't mean long coats! Just thought I'd make that clear!)
Geoff Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 Indeed. All my Linux boxes that handle files that end up on Windows clients do AV scans on said files. This is usually email, samba shares, ftp and web. So quite a lot of avenues causing a Linux server to be an unwitting distributor of windows malware.
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