Is Windows Defender Finally Good Enough?

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biggles

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Used to be the case that Windows Defender was not nearly as effective as the 3rd party antivirus solutions. But I have read recently that Defender has been greatly improved over the past several years. Do folks here think it is now good enough? If not, which security software is recommended for Windows 10 Home?
 
yeah its good enough if youre not doing a bunch of pirating. I still do a Malwarebytes scan every now and then. theres never been one that catches absolutely everything.
 
Windows Defender is not bad at all. For sure no worse than many other virus scanners these days which have shifted their business models from focusing on actually fighting viruses/malware to mainly marketing and trying to upsell customers to premium versions and subscriptions based on false fears. I'm talking about programs like McAfee which used to be among the best back in the day. Now it's all about sneaking their free version onto people's computers via things like an Adobe update and then using that free version to scare the user into thinking that they need to upgrade to a "premium" version that has a subscription. In many cases these days, when I'm working on a computer, I spend more time uninstalling these borderline-malware trialware scanners that get installed on people's computers than I do removing actual viruses or malware. Even Malwarebytes these days tries pretty hard to push their premium version via their free version.

Windows Defender has no such goals. It exists mainly at this point to help preserve the reputation of Windows and Microsoft overall. You already see Chromebook commercials trying to make it seem like all Windows computers are virus/malware infested cesspools. This is the image that Windows Defender is designed to fight. It's objectives are mutually beneficial to both Microsoft and people who simply want a safer PC. That is why it's actually pretty good. Only "problem" is that being the most popular scanner, due to being included in Windows by default, it's often the scanner that virus/malware authors target first and try the hardest to bypass.
 
If you're just a normal at home user - sure. It covers the common bases and unless you're running a bunch of questionable executables you're unlikely to run into an issue in the first place.
 
The reality is that no matter what you use, as a Windows user you're always under constant attack and vulnerable. You will never be safe unless you never join the internet and especially never plug in a USB stick.

All systems will always be vulnerable but you can choose if you want to join the line to go to pump the 1 dollar hooker unprotected or stick with your married spouse in the confinement of your home.
 
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The great thing about Windows is that it has capable security products. Nix based systems are just so secure that no one runs security products on then...... Resulting in targets that are easy to maintain access to once exploited.
 
I think it was around the time that I adopted Windows 10, and possibly before, I ditched all 3rd party virus and adware tools for Microsoft. I don't really regret it, although, I guess you don't regret it until you get screwed, then you regret it.

I remember the days of considering a Norton product an essential install. Those days are decades behind us. I think Windows Defender is great for the reasons given above - even the venerable MalwareBytes sucks the big one now with their "premium" upsell tactics.
 
Add in using a standard user account, Unchecky and some adblockers and you are pretty well set.

At the end of the day all AV get beat. I always tell folks if they bring me a machine hit with a virus that they are like windscreens, if it's your day to get a cracked one...
 
Defender has been good enough for years in my personal opinion. I haven't used a third party AV in at least 5-7 years. Had zero issues. Not gonna say it's perfect, but I'll definitely say it's good enough.
 
daglesj said:
Add in using a standard user account, Unchecky and some adblockers and you are pretty well set.

At the end of the day all AV get beat. I always tell folks if they bring me a machine hit with a virus that they are like windscreens, if it's your day to get a cracked one...
Click to expand...
Add in using Windows only as a virtual machine with an ability to one click snapshot revert in a matter of seconds, it starts to be useable. I haven't done anything relating to payment information or banking on windows for years simply due to not trusting any Windows installation to be clean.
 
Probably. Unless you plan on constantly checking on which AV solution is best Today and switching to it from whatever was best last week, you are stuck with picking one. Windows Defender seems to be in the running for a high rating often enough to qualify as good enough. On my primary box, I have Malwarebytes because I got one of the forever lifetime subscriptions when those were still available. For my other machines, I use the Microsoft solutions coupled with script and ad-blockers. The whole network is behind a real firewall appliance with a rather restrictive rule set.
 
atreidesgoldenpath said:
People don’t seem to get viruses like they used to. I don’t remember the last time I had to help a family member or friend clean a virus. I bet it’s been 5 years.
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For me it has been probably been 15. Every now and then I'll encounter some kind of random malware...but a virus? Not since the 00's or maybe even the 90's. Even malware isn't common like it was in the IE6 and before days.
With my elderly parents, just setting them up with Chrome and telling them not to run anything executable that isn't from an obviously legit source has eliminated 99% of issues. I used to have to spend hours cleaning up their PC every few months. I don't think I've even had to touch it in the last 4-5 years. They're just using Chrome + APB + Defender.
The doesn't mean that there aren't threats out there (especially at the enterprise level), but for home users it's night and day better.
 
atreidesgoldenpath said:
People don’t seem to get viruses like they used to. I don’t remember the last time I had to help a family member or friend clean a virus. I bet it’s been 5 years.
Click to expand...

I think the reason is that people started to understand they could make money by logging and selling information instead, so many forms of ransomware actually try to not be detected now. Let's face it, most PC Virus's were kinda obvious once you caught one.
 
Domingo said:
For me it has been probably been 15. Every now and then I'll encounter some kind of random malware...but a virus? Not since the 00's or maybe even the 90's. Even malware isn't common like it was in the IE6 and before days.
With my elderly parents, just setting them up with Chrome and telling them not to run anything executable that isn't from an obviously legit source has eliminated 99% of issues. I used to have to spend hours cleaning up their PC every few months. I don't think I've even had to touch it in the last 4-5 years. They're just using Chrome + APB + Defender.
The doesn't mean that there aren't threats out there (especially at the enterprise level), but for home users it's night and day better.
Click to expand...

yeah i'd say the biggest change has been browsers.. pretty much anything that use to be auto run scripts like in the old days where all you had to do was click a link and you were screwed, chrome, edge, and FF do a way better job isolating the pages so that anything and everything has to be confirmed by the user before it has access to the system.. i'd say right now the biggest risk is still corporate email systems where spam filtering is non existent since most of them use microsoft outlook on systems that maybe get updated once a year.
 
Nothing is perfect. More then once I have found Trojan droppers and malware cryptojacked systems with other tools that WD completely overlooked.
 
Only the poorly made viruses are obvious, the nasty ones run in the background and either steal your information or perform man in the middle attacks without the user realizing anything. On non-nat networks (like our cable used to be) there was on average 10 attack attempts per second. Nowadays almost everyone is NATed and/or firewalled so viruses don't spread so easy.
 
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