Security News > 2022 > January > No defence for outdated defenders as consumer AV nears RIP

The knowledge necessary to build viruses was practically the same as that needed for antivirus software, and the conspiracy theory arose that less-than-scrupulous AV vendors were generating viruses as well to spice up the market.

At the same time as AV software got worse, computers got better.

No hardware memory managers, no operating system with any concept of inter-process protection - barely the concept of process - and no concept of privileges, accounts or any form of access restriction to software or hardware.

By the time the first generation of AV software came along at the turn of the decade, things had barely changed.

The observant may have noted that data security has not been solved - but the attacks aren't the sort of thing that resident consumer AV software can do much about.

Keep up to date, and third-party security software you have to manage has no right to your system at all.

News URL

https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2022/01/10/opinion_column_consumer_av/