By Ryan Noyes

Recently my sister bought a brand-new MacBook for around $1,800 for college. I am not a Mac fan, but it is nice.

About a week ago she came to me asking why her laptop was “having a meltdown.” She said within seconds of starting it up, she saw popups, warnings and emergency alerts telling her to act quick or “click here to resolve the problem.” I knew right away that it was malware or adware. Within 20 minutes of helping her get rid of the malware, her computer was back to normal. This got me thinking — most people do not even know what malware or viruses are, or how to fix the problem. I am hoping this article will help.

First, some background information: What are viruses? What is malware? A virus is a harmful program that can copy itself to inflict damage to a computer. “Malware” is a term that includes all the different types of bad software. Some types are adware, keyloggers, ransomware, spyware, worms and viruses. That’s right, a virus is malware, and malware is sometimes a virus, but not always. Viruses are known as “legacy threats,” meaning that viruses never evolve or change at all.

So why have two different types of protective software if viruses are pretty much malware? Well, in the 1990s, viruses were a threat to computers, so software companies just called their products antiviruses. A reason that you might not expect is name recognition. More people know about viruses rather than malware. Still, there is more than just name recognition that makes these two different. Antiviruses protect against threats that never evolve or change (trojans, viruses and worms), and anti-malware protects against newer threats or threats to come (adware, keyloggers and spyware).

Which one should you choose? From my own experience, I would have one of each. For example, I have Norton Security, an antivirus, and Malwarebytes, an anti-malware program. I recommend having one of each because each tool can’t protect you from everything out there. Like I said, I use Norton for the older threats and Malwarebytes for the new threats.

There are many different types of antivirus and anti-malware out there, so there are plenty to choose from. Some recommendations for antivirus are Amiti, Avast, AVG, Bitdefender, Comodo, Forticlient and Windows Defender Security Center, which comes free with Windows. Some recommendations for anti-malware are Bitdefender, Cybereason, Emsisoft, Spybot and Webroot.

There you have it. I hope that I have helped at least a little explaining the differences between antivirus and anti-malware. I have given examples of the different software products so you can protect your computers, but there is much, much more out there that you can find. A lot of them are actually free, but if you want more tools or 24/7 support, you will have to pay a monthly or yearly fee.

Ryan Noyes is a member of the Information Technology Senior Seminar course and is planning on a career in Computer Engineer Analysis.

Link to online version of article: http://ryannoyes.us/beaconarticle/

Resources:

https://www.webroot.com/us/en/home/resources/tips/pc-security/security-what-is-anti-virus-software

http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/definition/antimalware