Ad-Aware Anniversary Edition Pro
Downloads Count: 114,529
License Type: Trial
Price: $40
Date Added: Jan 22, 2009
Operating Systems: Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista
File Size: 33735 KB
Author: Lavasoft
- Ad-Aware Anniversary Edition Free 15,812,088
- Spybot Search & Destroy 8,448,057
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Editorial Review of Ad-Aware Anniversary Edition Pro
The new, $40 Anniversary edition of Ad-Aware Pro, Lavasoft's anti-spyware application, is unfortunately nothing to celebrate. Though it brings in an antivirus engine to supplement its anti-spyware scans, the program missed a large percentage of malicious files--including adware and spyware--on test scans. And using it is no cakewalk, either.
In scanning tests from AV-Test.org, a German security product testing outfit, Ad-Aware Pro found only 83.6 percent of 111,833 Trojans, spyware and other malware samples. Its performance varied greatly by malware type; it stymied a respectable 96 percent of remote-control "backdoor" malware, for example, but identified only a dismal 77.4 percent of Trojans. Most surprising, it caught only 78.3 percent of adware and spyware.
Despite the addition of antivirus scans, Ad-Aware's performance doesn't hold up when compared with most antivirus programs, which today almost always include anti-spyware coverage. While the tests aren't directly comparable because AV-Test used a different (and much larger) sample set of malware, the best performers in our recent round-up of security suites successfully blocked around 99 percent of malware samples.
Ad-Aware didn't come out well when it came to our usage tests, either. Immediately after installing it, the program warned of suspicious files and ran a scan. As it turned out, the files were safe--and actually required for an encryption program. I took the recommended action of allowing access once (rather than quarantining or ignoring the files), which led to a frustrating loop with Ad-Aware re-displaying the same warning and running the required scan over and over.
Beyond that aggravating experience, using Ad-Aware is largely straightforward, despite some highly technical references throughout the app to things like ADS or MRUs. The program's interface contains sections that display program status, allow for easily scheduling of or executing scans, and let you control some real-time protections such as watching for malicious processes that start or attempts to access known unsafe Web sites.
The site-blocking feature did successfully block the Zango Web site, which distributes a generally unwanted adware download. But the real-time protection doesn't extend to scanning a file when it's saved to disk, as antivirus programs do. It's much better to block a Trojan or other nasty before it ever gets onto your PC.
Ad-Aware does check files when they're opened, and its behavior is likely meant to allow it to run alongside regular antivirus programs without conflict. Its poor showing at detecting malware means you'd have to run another security program for effective protection. But when antivirus programs can get rid of spyware, cookies and adware, Ad-Aware's $40 extra layer may not be worth it.
--Erik Larkin
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