Evening all Id like to get a detailed clear and well articul

Evening all,

I\'d like to get a detailed, clear, and well articulated answer to the below question. Please use correct english and grammar and proof-read your response. Please provide at least 2 detailed pages (double spaced), and provide at least one example and an abstract (executive summary) to start things off. PLEASE DO NOT COPY (PLAGIARISM) OFF THE INTERNET.

Question for essay: Is a computer with antivirus software protected from viruses? Why or why not? In your response, please incorporate Mac. vs PC vs Mobile devices (eg. iPhone, Android, etc.).

Solution

If the same question was asked before 10-15 years ago, the answer is Yes. But in current conditions, i would say NO.

Coming to Why:

So having only antivirus will not help in current scenario Threat landscape. Virus/ malware are smart enough to evade antivirus technologies which only works on SIgnature based. Hence the antivirus vendors started developing new technologies packed along with the traditional Signature based detection. Few among them are Behavioral Analysis, Firewall technologies, HIDS/HIPS(Host Intrusion Detection and Prevention) and also Application Control. Even after having all these technologies packed in one Antivirus cannot assure you the security of your system.

As i said, due to the emerging threat lanscape in parallel to vulnerabilities detected in Cyber space, there are high chances of getting compromised. In the field of Cyber space or Information Security, you cannot say that \"I am secured\".

Lets take an example of a common person who is connected to internet via his/ her laptop:

So lets consider, one of your friend has got a mail from a bank or a friend which had a link in it. He would definitely click on it and see what is there in the link. A normal user might not think much about the link as he got the mail from either his friend or from the registered bank. But in the back ground, there might be a different scenario altogether. Your friend might have got the mail from an attacker who sent malicious link which looks like a genuine link using Spoofing technique(IP Spoofing, URL Spoofing and email spoofing are the techniques used by attackers to gain the access of a computer system)

As i said, when your friend clicks on the link sent by attacker, a malicious file gets downloaded and starts performing the malicious activity which it is targeted to. Once the malicious file executes, it might capture the keystrokes of your computer system or might copy sensitive data which is observed in your system. Also it might look for the current vulnerabilities identified in your computer and take advantage of those by giving control to remote servers controlled by malware attackers.

So, if all the above conditions are met, you can be in a belief that i am secured from viruses. If not you have gates open to invite a malware in many ways.

Coming to MAC vs PC vs Mobile

MAC OS is considerably safe when compared to Windows. As we all know, the users of Windows are high, hence attackers would also target high no of users. Attackers would search for all possible vulnerabilities in an windows system and target those to compromise. Microsoft regularly releases their security updates/ patches for their softwares and do release every second tuesday of a month. Where as MAC releases security patches when ever identified. When compared to Windows, MAC OS do have additional security features which would allow applications to be installed only from Trusted sources.

When you look at Windows OS, MS-OFFICE and ADOBE Reader are the cmmon applications one would use. If you look at ADOBE, they have enough vulnerabilities which would encourage attackers to target their applications. Similarly when we talk about IOS and android, IOS is secure than Android. We know that ANDROID is an open platform that any one can tweak and create applications, this is not the case with IOS. IOS have a security control on what they publish in their applicaitons.

As a Final Conclusion, It is always good to be aware of current threat landscape and vulnerabilities. In parallel to this, lets keep our machines updated with the latest patches and signatures of Antivirus to be in a belief that we are secured.