During the Nebraskan winter of 2002, Tom Broekemeier went looking for protection.

An search for “free antivirus protection,” to be exact. And his internet search brought up a brand-new product called avast – released just 11 days earlier.

Now, over nine years after first installing avast! on his home computer, he is still with avast!. “It is free, easy to use, and WORKS,” explained Tom. Read more…

avast! Virus Lab… I once went to their floor accidentally, thinking it was my floor – it was dark and scary, and so I quickly turned and ran out. These folks are like mad scientists, practicing alchemy in white laboratory coats that are stained with hard-drive smoke and smell of burnt ones & zeros. They’re mostly nocturnal – like cyborgian vampires – and yet they’re always awake, online and available for ‘chat’ or email, even in daylight.

Or at least that’s partly the stereotype I had when I started at AVAST. After meeting and talking with a few “virus guys” at a company party, I realized they’re like every other department here… but just a little more reclusive… and thus maybe a ‘typical’ IT crowd. See here for yourself, as this interview is with a guy whose blog posts get a lot of traffic (even though someone of my IT ‘capabilities’ rarely understands anything he writes about). –Jason Mashak

Michal Krejdl (Senior Virus Analyst)

1. You started at AVAST about 6 years ago, while still attending university – what was it like already working for a top antivirus provider while still a student?

I was a young chemistry student (which seems removed from IT, but even AVAST co-founder Pavel Baudis studied the same subject, at the same university ) with no previous job experience or references. Most of the aspects of IT (including reverse engineering, programming in various languages, cryptography, etc.) were my hobby, and thus it was no problem to work for ALWIL [former name of AVAST Software, until 2010]. I had no clue what the business was about – it took me roughly a year to fully understand how a two-person project could become a successful company Read more…

We know what fake antivirus is: malware posing as real antivirus while hijacking your computer and wallet. Then there is real antivirus: applications such as avast! and our competitors.

And now there is a third category: semi-fake antivirus. It’s not a blatant malware attack and may actually include a real antivirus application. From a strictly technical perspective, it might not even be called malware.

But one thing is clear: it is still taking money from consumers in a way that some would call fraudulent.

Recently, I got an email from the UK-based Computeractive about an irate customer wanting a refund on avast! Pro. It seems that the person went on the internet, searched for avast, and found a site offering special download services and videos. They ended up getting a messed-up computer and spending over $100.

And then there is the French Connection: avast2011.fr-01.net. Combining avast, the year, and a major French IT portal together into a very attractive domain name; hackers created Read more…

The main role of antivirus being of course to catch viruses, borrowing computer terminology from the human environment is fitting… virus spreads from machine to machine, infecting them just like a flu. And just like in the case of influenza or other virus-type diseases, knowing the virus is the first step to a cure.

In the case of computers, it gets slightly complicated, because while nature presents a new influenza subtype about once a year and only now and then does it really get out of hand, virus creators are getting much faster at “turnaround” in their development of new viruses. Read more…

I don’t know about you, but I really like taking the new avast! 6.0 features – WebRep, for example — for a test drive. With the beta 6.0 installed, I opened Google.com and quickly typed in “Longhotlegs” to see what would pop up. I even forgot to add the spaces. In my top five results, there was a stocking e-shop for women (no rating), strip bar in the UK (no rating), the TMZ celebrity blog (green rating), and – my favorite – a Wikipedia entry for Pholciadae.

This spider family includes the creature commonly known as “daddy long-legs”.

From the WebRep perspective, Google.com has a “good rating with many votes” while en.wikipedia.org has a “good rating with few voters”. Read more…

The new avast! 6.0 was spotted at the Prague Café Imperial this Thursday.

The “Additional Protection” features in the 6.0 version are more difficult to photograph than the art deco ceramics in this  historic Prague hotel.

Other pictures of the new 6.0 are available here. Read more…

avast! sports fans around the world want to know: Will the world’s most popular free antivirus program make it to Super Bowl XLV?

Yes, it would be a long shot. But I’m betting that if avast! shows up at the number one event for American football, it will be instantly recognized by thousands of supporters.

Recent months have showed avast! steadily moving up the sporting ranks, getting a foothold in a variety of arenas. If avast! can handle NBA basketball and professional wrestling, – it can handle professional (American) football. Read more…

I promised to follow on the most-download-software-statistics post from last week and shed some light on the real number… the number of avast! users.   But before that, let me get back to the history a little because what seems as the most obvious thing now – didn’t look quite so obvious 9 years ago.

It was only in January 2002 when AVAST introduced for the first time its free antivirus and allowed home, non-commercial users to use it for free.    During the whole first month following the introduction only  93 (!) users downloaded, installed and registered the free version.

Some say, getting the “first million” is the most difficult part.  Read more…

To provide free antivirus security means making the product available for people to download.  Obviously, the number of downloads is then a good indication of how popular the product is (well, it needs to be taken with grain of salt… there is more to it than just one number … but it’s a good indication, nonetheless )

First, we got a note from CNet a week or so ago that avast! was the 2^nd most-downloaded antivirus on download.com in 2010 (behind AVG).  Moreover, avast! has the highest editors’ and users’ ranking, which naturally put smiles on our faces.  Read more…