anti-virus for less-technical users?

[cellio]

Somebody asked me this morning for help finding reliable advice about anti-virus software for his PC. He's currently using Norton (I don't know details, including what updates he's getting). I think he's going to need to find something simple -- fire-and-forget would be best (so automatic updates, at least). Who out there is currently doing reasonable neutral product comparisons in this area (Windows, not Mac)? If I could point him to one site where he could learn enough to make a decision, what would that site be?

I did talk with him about hygiene, it being far better to *avoid getting* viruses than to clean them up after. He says he's not opening unknown attachments or browsing in bad neighborhoods (though we didn't talk about how he would know, so I don't know if that's correct), but he's getting a lot of viruses and trojans. Or warnings about them, anyway; I haven't dismissed the possibility that he's picked up some malware that's doing that.

Comments

[dsrtao]

Simplest and cheapest: Microsoft Defender/Security Essentials from
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/14210/security-essentials-download

The warnings that he's getting are likely to largely be generated by ads; installing an adblocker on every browser is a good idea.

[alienor]

Seconding this. My husband is in the cyber security field and this is what runs on my PCs (I had 2, but one got converted to Linux 2 days ago because OLD). He runs more finicky stuff on his PCs but that doesn't sound like what your friend wants. Following basic hygiene I've never had a problem.

My go-to site for neutral, well researched product comparisons (The Wirecutter) doesn't appear to have reviewed anti-virus. I asked N if he knew of a good research site off hand, and he didn't.

[cahwyguy]

Look at the comparisons on PCWorld. I'm currently using Avast, a free AV tool, which works pretty well.

[damont]

I also use Avast, which has the advantage of having versions for MacOS and Linux as well.

[metahacker]

As a side note, there are a lot of trojan horses that try to trick you into installing them by masquerading as an anti-virus warning. They are especially common on sites people don't want to admit to using (porn). Adblockers will help, but education is really the best medicine. (After a good blocker as recommended elsethread.)