F-Secure compatibility

mWave

Hello,

 

I remember awhile back I went to install F-Secure Anti-Virus for testing purposes and was greeted with a warning about how Xvirus Personal Guard was not "compatible" and had to be removed off the system first. I have not re-checked if this is still the case but would like to know if they are both now compatible with each other.

 

Xvirus Personal Guard is a second-opinion Anti-Malware product developed in the .NET framework - of course I am not condoning that the .NET framework alone is a good idea for a security product (due to lack of control over the system) however I will not go into product development flaws... I just want to know the reasons behind why it was not compatible previously and if this is still the case.

 

In my eyes, it is not very logical... When F-Secure was claiming it was not compatible with Xvirus Personal Guard, you could just remove Xvirus and then re-install it after F-Secure was installed, and there were no compatibility issues found after doing this.

 

It just makes me wonder why F-Secure blacklisted Xvirus Personal Guard on the installer for "compatibility" issues without elaborating the reasons for doing so? Hopefully this still isn't the case.

 

If anyone can let me know, that'd be great.

 

Thank you for your time.

Ville

Hello @mWave

 

Compatibility between anti-malware products is a tricky thing to verify. Two anti-malware products might see each others virus signatures and detect them as viruses. One might try to quarantine a virus and the other one might block this operation due to it being a virus. Also if there is any hooking done (DeepGuard) then two anti-malware products might hook over the other's hooks, preventing them from working properly. These compatibility issues are hard to notice - everything seems to work fine but then at a critical moment the protection may not works as designed.

 

 

So the compatiblity check is mostly due to us (in R&D) not having time to verify dozens of other anti-malware products not interfering with out product. It does not mean that we have necessarily found a compatibility issue. It's simpler to just say "use one anti-malware product" and not worry about these things.

 

In the end, it's your computer and your choice what to do, but keep in mind that running multiple anti-malware products may mean that you don't have full protection from any of them.

 

 

Ville

(F-Secure R&D)