Today, we received an email from one of the four winners of last December’s Facebook game Member Gets Member. The object of the game was to introduce your friends to avast! Antivirus by inviting them to our Facebook page. When your friends liked our page, you earned points, and earned points gave you the chance to win a cool new Windows Surface tablet. That’s exactly what Micah, from the Philippines, did.

Hello Julia!

Micah with her prize from Avast!

Attached here is my picture with the Microsoft Surface tablet. I am very thankful of having such reward. But not only that, I am very thankful also of using Avast as my antivirus because it’s very fine and does excellent performance for my devices. I hope you guys will still make such events or contests like this Member gets Member game and keep on giving such awards for those Avast supporters and users.

Thank you so much and more power!

Micah L
One of the Microsoft Tablet Winner

We are glad to learn that you are enjoying your Microsoft Surface, Micah, and we’re happy to inform you that tomorrow a new opportunity to win will begin.

NEW PHOTO CONTEST

The #avastBeFree Photo Contest lets you express your creativity in photos. All you do is interpret our slogan avast! Be Free and enter your photo on our Facebook app, or through Twitter or Instagram using the hashtag #avastBeFree. We are giving away eight Nexus devices – mobile phones and tablets, plus 100 free license of avast! Internet Security. You could be a winner!

The #avastBeFree Photo Contest begins tomorrow, Wednesday, May 15. Learn more about the contest from our blog post.

Watch the video here

The AVAST Software social media team love challenges;  it stimulates our creativity.  Despite the fact that there is hardly any way to photograph antivirus software, we decided to establish an official AVAST channel at Instagram.  “A picture is worth a thousand words”!  We fell for this inspiring and creative social network, so please check us out!

Meet avast! teddy bear

Just like avast! Antivirus, our teddy bear can be found all over the world. He is a great protector, a cute travelling companion, and loves to Be Free. Read more…

Once you start using avast! Free Antivirus, you quickly realize what a quality product it is and want to share it with your family members and friends. We have created an easy way for you to recommend avast!, and at the same time earn points toward a free 1-year license of avast! Internet Security.

The steps are pretty easy.

First, you need a my.avast! account. If you don’t have an account it is simple to create one.  All you need is an email address or Facebook login. Go to https://my.avast.com to create yours now or open the avast! program and go to the “Recommend” tab.  I’ll tell you some benefits of having an account at the end of this post.

Once you have a my.avast! account, you can recommend avast! Free Antivirus using your very own special download link. Share this link with friends or family easily through your social networks or email.

Your special link will look similar to this one, http://www.avast.com/get/Hcwuc5aY

You can get your own link in two places:

1. Your my.avast account web page: https://my.avast.com/recommendation

2. The avast! user interface – Click on the avast! icon in the bottom right-hand corner of your screen, then click the Recommend tab. It will look like this:

Once your friend installs avast! from your link and starts using it, a credit is counted toward your my.avast! account. When you reach 7 friends, you can download your free Internet Security license. If you have lots of friends, you can keep going – 14 friends, you get a 2-year license; 21 friends, you get a 3-year license.

Benefits of having a my.avast account

• You can register any avast! free product which you have installed and which requires registration
• You can remotely control your mobile devices on which avast! Mobile Security is installed
• You can track the basic data about all your connected devices (program/virus database version, activity log, etc.)

Thank you for using avast! Antivirus and recommending us to your friends and family. For all the latest news, fun and contest information, please follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

You could win 1 of 9 Nexus devices! All you have to do is visit the Android Police contest page and answer this question:

What feature (or features) would you like to see added to avast! Mobile Security?

Visit the Android Police contest page now, read through the description of the contest, and add your answer to the comments section. That’s it! You could win 1 of 9 Nexus devices! The contest begins now and will run for one week, ending on Saturday, April 20th at 12:00AM PT (Midnight). After that, winners will be picked randomly.

Enter now and share with your friends.

Learn more about avast! Mobile Security:

Avast welcomed students and professors from the School of Electrical Engineering at Czech Technical University in Prague to our headquarters on Tuesday, April 9. The visitors learned about Avast’s “freemium” business model from Martin Zima our Free Products Marketing Director, and heard 4 technical presentations ranging from “How we deal with large datasets” from Michal Augustýn, Senior Software Developer to an “Analyst’s Life – fighting cybercrime and having fun!” from two of our Malware Analysts, Martin Šmarda and Pavel Šrámek.

Thank you to all the students for your questions, open discussion and an active approach to many technical topics. And congratulations to Martin Burian who won a Google Nexus 7.

Already this year, we have hosted students working toward their MBA’s from Penn State University, Villanova University and the University of Alabama. If you are interested in visiting Avast headquarters next time you are in Prague, we would like to hear from you. Please leave a comment below.

Read more…

At Avast, we know how precious a good night’s sleep is. You can relax and sleep soundly knowing that avast! Antivirus is protecting your devices. From your family’s PCs or Macs to the Android phone in your pocket or tablet on your nightstand – avast! is guarding against prowlers, snoops, and thieves.

Check out the avast! Store for family-friendly offers on multiple device protection. And…Sweet Dreams!

It has been two or three months since I last blogged about Android malware. But that definitely doesn’t mean there aren’t any new threats. There are plenty! Here are two quick comparisons from the last two years: Growth of the malware problem of the platform in January 2012 compared with January 2013 is far from the ‘normal’ growth of other platforms. According to our statistics, it’s something around +850 percent! Add another year for an even more insane comparison – the growth from January 2011 to January 2013 gives us +3150 percent! The Android platform is definitely one of the most targeted malware platforms these days. But no worries, users of Avast! Free Mobile Security are safe. Read more…

Don’t miss our LIVE presentation of the new avast! Free Antivirus version 8! We’ve just released it today and this is your chance to be one of the first to see what avast! version 8 is all about.

We will be broadcasting our Hangout, live from Prague, Czech Republic, starting at 7 PM EST on February 28th (today). There are several ways you can view it:

• Add Avast to your Google+ circles, and we’ll post the link there. RSVP to our event and you’ll get the link automatically.
• You will also be able to watch it live on the avast YouTube channel.
• Just before we go live we will post a link to our avast Facebook page . When you see it, CLICK IT, and please be sure share with your friends!

Watch our video invitation.

We look forward to seeing you there.

Make sure you friend Avast on Facebook so you won’t miss our original comic strip, MALWARE ATTACKS!!. Here’s a quick catch-up in case you missed the first installment -

We meet unfortunate aliens fleeing their embattled home world in search of help against the evil Malware Empire. The fate of their planet rests on their success.

Illustrated by Daniel Coca López

Alien visitors come to Earth seeking help from Avast against the evil Malware Empire.

The desperate aliens visit Avast headquarters to ask for help to defeat the evil Malware Empire. Just like 177 million Earthlings who use Avast to protect themselves, the aliens find what they are looking for.

Armed with avast! Free Antivirus 8, the aliens race back to their home planet. Victory against the evil Malware Empire is assured.

Thanks to avast! Free Antivirus 8, the galaxy is once again protected against Malware. Our heroes are awarded with the medal for bravery, and avast! 8 takes its place of honor in history.

Protect your world with avast! 8. From avast! Free Antivirus to our newest top-tier suite, Avast Premier 8, it can all be found on http://www.avast.com