We already mentioned some of the major improvements in Avira AntiVir 9. What we didn’t cover yet are some of the minor changes which make AntiVir easier to control and to use.

For example our developers overhauled the upload mechanism for suspicious executable files from the quarantine. Up to AntiVir 8, you were needed to enter your email address and your mailserver so the samples could be sent via email. Now you can send us such samples by a simple click – the new implementation uses a so called http upload.

Also, our programmers improved the “kill protection” for AntiVir processes. This prevents malware from forcefully stopping the AntiVir Guard. Furthermore the file protection got enhanced. The gamers among the Avira users will like the new automatic game mode which disables popups from the firewall when AntiVir detects a running game on the computer.

For the more and more popular netbook devices – tiny notebooks with reduced display size and resolution -, we now adopt the size of the AntiVir user interface. Therefor it is now possible to properly control AntiVir even on netbooks.

We also listened to the demands of AntiVir users who didn’t like that the scanner waited for user interaction when it detected malware. A new configuration option will allow to scan the selected paths or devices and show a summary of detected malware at the end. There it is possible to clean up the infections with a single click.

In the summary all these tiny improvements help making AntiVir 9 an even easier to use and more user friendly antivirus solution. You should give it a try when it will be released.

Dirk Knop
Technical Editor

We have introduced a new feature for the Firewall integrated in the Avira Premium Security Suite. The feature is called Privileged applications and is about making the life of a user much easier.

In AV8, if you allow a program to connect to the network, its traffic is going to be filtered through the adapter rules first. This means, for example, that if you want to start a program which needs some responses from the network while the Security Level is High, the incoming traffic will be blocked. So, even if you allowed your application to access the net, it must obey the Adapter rules. If these rules filter some traffic needed by the application, it will simply not function correctly.

Technically speaking, the traffic is now filtered like this:

Fig. 1: The new firewall architecture.

What has changed?

In the new version of the firewall, for the applications which are marked as privileged we changed the order in which the rules are applied. The adapter rules are ignored for the traffic coming to the process ID of the application which was allowed with the privileged status. From this point on, when you allow an application in the firewall, it will simply function correctly, no matter what kind of security level you have.

How to enable this special status

When the popup for the application is displayed, you must enable the checkbox „allow privileged” and click on the „Allow” button. That’s it…

Fig. 2: Firewall popup for new applications.

Once you allowed such an application, you can see and change its status in the Configuration Center:

Fig. 3: Enhanced configuration of the firewall.

The applications which are normally allowed by clicking only the „Allow” button without enabling the checkbox above are marked as „Filtered”; the applications which had the checkbox active, are marked as „Privileged”.

The initial value of the checkbox can be configured in the Configuration Center, under Popup Settings.

Fig. 4: Configuration for the application popups presets.

WARNING:
This feature is a huge step toward a better usability of the product. However, please be very careful which programs you allow as privileged.

Sorin Mustaca
Manager International Software Development

Currently we’re developing and testing the Avira products in version 9. Since the beta is already out, it’s time to take a look at some of the new features we were adding. The release of the new products should take place in March.

One of the features that users were asking for in our security suite were parental controls. We listened to those requests and our developers did a great job of adding them!

Fig. 1: The configuration screen for the parental controls in Avira Premium Security Suite 9.

The parental controls are meant for parents who want to restrict and/or control the internet usage of their children. Children shouldn’t need to look at pornographic web sites for example, and online gambling isn’t suitable for them either.

We implemented the web filter on protocol level as addition to the WebGuard so it works independant from the web browser in use – may it be the Internet Explorer, Opera, Firefox or Safari. The filtering is done based upon roles, where each account on the computer can get its own ruleset.

Say, you have two accounts, Administrator and Kids. Administrator can use the pre-defined profile for adults, and if someone logs into the machine as Kids, the rules (for example the pre-defined Child-profile) are active.

You can define your own profiles and choose from roundabout 15 categories like pornography, entertainment and so on and allow or forbid the users of such a profile to view web sites falling into these categories. Additionally the Administrator can add web sites to allow or forbid anyhow, even if the profile categories say otherwise (black- and whitelisting).

The administrator can (and should!) protect the configuration with a password, so that restricted accounts can’t modify the rules that are in place.

Dirk Knop
Technical Editor