Anti-virus, needed?

[AlexHouse]

I've not used an anti-virus program in years, mainly because I don't go onto suspicious website or download suspicious files, am I being stupid?, I've never had any trouble, is an anti-virus program needed these days, if so what is recommended?

[The Sloth]

depends on the person, i use commonsense+ windows security( i have up to date window 10)+ ublock+ add blocker+privicy badger   

[MrMcMuffinJr]

Just download Avast and be done with it. It's piece of mind.

[swordsman247]

If you have windows 10 it has a pretty good anti virus built into it.

[Vigilante505]

Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it

[Enderman]

You should have at least windows defender running.

Just because you don't download or go to suspicious sites does not mean you can't get a virus.

Maybe you have a virus and don't even know about it because you don't use an antivirus?

[Techicolors]

Windows defender, adblocker, and common sense is good enough. 

 

but i still suggest getting an antivirus. ESET is a good choice

also malwarebytes, which defends against malware, rootkits, etc. 

[Daniel644]

20 minutes ago, Enderman said:

You should have at least windows defender running.

Just because you don't download or go to suspicious sites does not mean you can't get a virus.

Maybe you have a virus and don't even know about it because you don't use an antivirus?

Gotta love those folks they say they don't use Anti-virus's and then say they've never had a virus.

 

to the OP, USE AN ANTIVIRUS, if you have Windows 10 you atleast have the built in one, if not DEFINITELY, even GENUINE sites have been infected with malware/viurs's that have infected computers just from users going to the page, over the years I've read about several BIG web pages getting malware on the homepage.

[Mira Yurizaki]

9 minutes ago, Daniel644 said:

Gotta love those folks they say they don't use Anti-virus's and then say they've never had a virus.

 

to the OP, USE AN ANTIVIRUS, if you have Windows 10 you atleast have the built in one, if not DEFINITELY, even GENUINE sites have been infected with malware/viurs's that have infected computers just from users going to the page, over the years I've read about several BIG web pages getting malware on the homepage.

Except depending on the AV suite, it can be just as bad as having a virus on your computer: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/01/antivirus-is-bad/

Quote

The problem, from the perspective of the browser makers, is that antivirus software is incredibly invasive. Antivirus, in an attempt to catch viruses before they can infect your system, forcibly hooks itself into other pieces of software on your computer, such as your browser, word processor, or even the OS kernel. O'Callahan gives one particularly egregious example: "Back when we first made sure ASLR was working for Firefox on Windows, many AV vendors broke it by injecting their own ASLR-disabled DLLs into our processes." ASLR, or address-space layout randomisation, is one of the better protections against buffer overflow exploits.

And the malware that those websites get are due to poorly monitored ad servers. If you're a "terrible" person like me, you probably have an ad-blocking tool. If you're even more paranoid you'd use NoScript.

[veinoreb]

IF you have powerful pc then KAspersky