What's New in F-Secure SAFE for PC and Internet Security This article outlines important changes and features, as well as fixes released in the latest versions of F-Secure SAFE for PC and Internet Security.
Version 18.5 (5.0.1092)
Released October 2022
- New features
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- You can see the detections, if any, during a virus scan in the progress circle. Details of each detection are visible on mouse hover.
- You can follow the progress of a scheduled scan on the product main view under "Recent events" and in the "Event history" view while the scan is running. If you wish you can cancel an ongoing scheduled scan in the "Event history" view.
- You can now export and import your blocked and allowed website lists in the Website exceptions dialog.
- New licensing system. This change is completely transparent from the user's point of view.
- Fixed issues:
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- The issue with Windows toast notifications not always showing for detections has been fixed.
- The issue where a 3rd-party Anti-Virus warning couldn't be permanently dismissed has been fixed.
Version 18.4 (4.90.1143)
Released August 2022
- Third-party AV products are no longer removed automatically
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- The automatic removal of conflicting 3rd-party AV products has been removed from the product installation.
- You will be warned about existing 3rd-party AV products in the product main user interface via a smart task. This also happens if you afterwards install a 3rd-party AV product on the computer.
- Other improvements
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- DeepGuard no longer blocks certain Steam games. You are no longer required to exclude Steam games from scanning or turn off DeepGuard to run them.
- A smart task warning let's you know if Tamper protection is turned off.
- Time lock screens support dark mode.
Version 18.3 (4.80.1649)
Released April 2022
- Account information and device name visible in the main user interface
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- The account name, email address and device name are visible in the main user interface. This makes it easier to recognize the account and device being used.
- The information is automatically updated once it's changed in the My F-Secure portal.
- Manual virus scan dialog improvements
- The manual virus scan dialog has been enhanced in the following ways:
- You can now resize the virus scan dialog.
- The Items found view shows a short summary of the findings.
- Items are sorted by infection type: "Harmful files", "Unwanted applications", and "Potentially unwanted applications".
- The default action can be overridden for all items of the same infection type with one click instead of one by one.
- Other improvements
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- Family Rules / Parental Control supports a new content filter category: "Streaming media".
- The Viruses & Threats and Secure Browsing & Banking views show more detailed scanning and detection statistics.
- You can manually reset the reputation cache through the product Settings > Support view. You can clear the reputation cache once a false file or website reputation information has been fixed in the Security Cloud. This ensures that you have the latest file and reputation information in use.
- The WebView2 console debugger is a useful new feature when our support needs to find more information about issues with embedded web views. You can find the WebView2 console debugger option in the product Settings > Support view. To be able to see this option, you need to enable the debug logging first.
- Software rendering option in the system tray menu. This option can be used if there are rendering issues with the user interface. To see this option in the product's system tray menu, press and hold the shift key while you right-click the product's system tray icon.
Version 18.2 (4.70.1302)
Released November 2021
- Easier access to My F-Secure
- This version of SAFE brings added functionality to the People & Devices view, allowing you to manage your licenses, devices, and people in your group directly through the People & Devices view instead of logging into My F-Secure with the browser.
- ID Monitoring in the main view
- You can now access the ID Monitoring page directly from the product's main view if you have an ID PROTECTION subscription. You no longer need to log into My F-Secure with the browser.
- Tamper protection functionality added
- Tamper protection is a new addition that prevents you or any software, such as harmful applications, from disabling protection processes and changing the product's content in the installation folder or the registry settings.
- Other improvements
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- The product's main user interface now supports high contrast mode.
- Banking protection's remote access blocking capability has been improved.
Version 18.1
Released September 2021
- Remote access protection
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- When a banking session starts, Banking protection detects and blocks remote access to your computer and displays a warning. This prevents phone scammers from leveraging remote access software to perform online thefts.
- The feature is limited to Anydesk and TeamViewer, but more applications are to be added later this year.
- Automatic gaming mode
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- When a game starts, the product goes into gaming mode automatically. This pauses the software and database updates, as well as scheduled scanning.
- The feature is available in Windows 10 RS5 or newer versions.
- All user interfaces now with .NET technology
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- All user interfaces have been converted to .NET technology.
- The change has been implemented, as the old user interface needed to be loaded into memory after restart, affecting the computer performance. It was also always running in the background, consuming memory and a little bit of CPU. The new .NET-based user interface now loads into the memory only when needed, resulting in less resource usage while the product still protects you in the background.
- Short-cut to install and start ID PROTECTION
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- ID PROTECTION appears in the main user interface if you have a license for it.
- You can install the product from the shortcut also after installation, and you can also start the product from here.
- Other improvements
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- Windows 11 support
- Dark mode support
- Serbian language support
- Notifications to install the Browser extension appear at the same time for multiple browsers. If using multiple browsers, this allows you to set up the Browsing extension separately for a given browser.
- Hot keys, for example, Alt+Tab, Alt+Space cannot be used to switch away from the Time limit lock screen. In addition, countdown before locking the computer has been reduced from 60 seconds to 30 seconds.
- Login during installation happens as part of main UI with Microsoft Edge WebView2 (Chromium engine). This requires Microsoft Edge WebView2 runtime to be installed. If it's not, the installer installs it for you.
- Other improvements released earlier as channel updates
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- Banking protection session ends automatically when you close the bank tab or open another web page. This is especially handy when using bank credentials to authorize access to another website.
- BypassIO support: Windows 11 has an optimized I/O path for reading from files. This helps to meet the I/O demands of loading and running next-generation games on Windows.
- Removed features
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- Selecting Gaming mode from the tray icon has been removed. This is now fully automatic and cannot be manually enabled any more.
- The product update message has been simplified and now links directly to the release notes.
Version 18.0
Released May 2021
- A completely redesigned main user interface with smart tasks
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- The main user interface has been reworked with .NET technology, and only consumes resources when open.
- Important events open the main user interface automatically, offering an easy way to solve them. You can dismiss tasks that you don't consider important.
- Events are shown in the main user interface, and subviews only show events and statistics that relate to a specific subview.
- High resolutions, resizing, and accessibility features are now fully supported.
- Allowed and blocked websites and time limits get a facelift
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- The user interface for allowed and blocked websites, and time limits has been reworked with .NET technology.
- The URL address is validated when adding a new website entry.
- You can select multiple website entries and remove them at the same time.
- Keyboard shortcuts (Delete and Ctrl+C) are supported.
- When the time limit has been reached, the child is locked out of the session after 60 seconds.
- Easy sample submission directly from Quarantine
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- Quarantined items can be reported to the Security Cloud directly from the app and file control user interface.
- Other user interface improvements and product enhancements
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- The user interface for Banking Protection minimizes automatically, so that it does not prevent accessing browser tabs.
- The in-app Help has been changed to an HTML-based and .NET technology.
- All system infection components removed by real-time scanning are listed in the event history user interface.
- Quarantined items are not allowed if they are pending a computer restart.
- The next scheduled scan is shown once the feature has been configured.
- Allowing a website from the browser's block page opens a confirmation dialog.
- The Microsoft Edge browsing protection extension is installed from the Microsoft Store. The extension can also be installed manually from the settings user interface.
- Turning off all protection requires you to select when the protection is to be turned back on.
- Product upgrades wait until virus scans or protected banking sessions end.
- Removed features
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- Family rules is no longer available for adult users.
- The Action Center ("Messages") has been merged with the main user interface. There is no longer the option to view messages in the tray icon.
- Internet Explorer no longer triggers missing or disabled browser extension warnings. The browser extension is still installed and can be enabled.
Version 17.9
Released November 2020
- Banking protection logic and security improvements with redesigned user interface
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- Applications that are trusted in the Security Cloud are allowed to connect to the internet during a banking session.
- Command line and scripting tools are not allowed to connect to the internet during a banking session.
- Payment site handling during a banking session has been improved.
- The Banking protection user interface has been redesigned. The new user interface is less intrusive and handles large resolutions and multiple monitors.
- Manual and scheduled scanning improvements
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- Virus scan handling of large harmful item collections has been improved.
- Virus scan no longer shows 'Memory: 0 items'.
- The file scanning phase is shown with green color instead of yellow.
- The Scan report has been improved, and its style has been updated to match with the rest of the product.
- New scheduled and command line scanner (fsscan.exe)
- Scheduled scanning logic has been modified; duplicate entries for the same infections should not occur any more.
- New Event history
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- The new Event history runs in a separate process; it has better performance and consumes less memory while open.
- The user interface has the same look and feel as the App and file control.
- Other improvements
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- When a USB storage device is inserted, a notification is shown, asking if you want to scan the device.
- Search result ratings are shown also if you use the DuckDuckGo search engine.
- The issue with Chrome extension check not working if Chrome was installed under user's folder has now been fixed.
- The App and file control dialog allows you to select multiple items and perform operations on them.
- The Support page in Settings has an option to turn on debug logging.
- Other scanning engine improvements since the last release
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- Implemented online scanning for malicious URLs.
- Vastly improved AMSI script scanning performance and stability.
- Enhanced protection against malicious browser downloads.
- Enhanced archive scanning stability.
- Enhanced robustness for engine updates.
Version 17.8
Released June 2020
- Completely redesigned Browsing and Banking protection
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- Secure Browsing, also known as Browsing Protection, has been completely reworked.
- Block pages for Browsing Protection, Content Filtering, and Daily Time Limit have a new visual look.
- The new Banking Protection engine requires the "Browsing Protection by F-Secure" browser extension to be installed and turned on in a supported browser to activate a banking session.
- The "Browser extension not in use" notification is shown when a supported browser is launched and the browser extension is not installed or turned on. Dismissing the notification silences the notification for that browser.
- The browser extension installation can be started by selecting "Set up" in the notification or in the main user interface.
- Microsoft Edge (Chromium-based) browser is now supported along with Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, and Internet Explorer.
- Visualization and accessibility updates to virus scanning
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- Better support for various display scaling settings and multi-display setups, while retaining the functionality and look-and-feel of the previous Virus Scan.
- The Narrator app can be used to read elements on the screen and Virus Scan can be controlled by keyboard, touch, and mouse.
- You can run multiple manual scanning tasks at the same time (except for multiple parallel scans in the "system scan" phase).
- Memory scan is now visualized during the scan.
- Visualization and accessibility updates to App and file control
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- Better support for various display scaling settings and multi-display setups.
- The Narrator app can be used to read elements on the screen and App and file control can be controlled by keyboard, touch, and mouse.
- Supports Microsoft Antimalware Scan Interface to block harmful scripts
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- Added support for the Microsoft Antimalware Scan Interface standard, which allows other applications to use the scanning engines to scan their data for harmful scripts and macros and stop them before they can do any harm.
- Available on Windows 10.
- Other improvements
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- Product updates no longer shut down the security core. During a product update, Windows should no longer warn that the security product is turned off.
- Product updates and security core updates can no longer happen at the same time. Previously these resulted in a security core update failure and a retry in the next update.
- Flyer notifications on Windows 7 and 8 have a new visual look.
- Other scanning engine improvements since last release
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- DeepGuard can now trigger Security Cloud analysis on files that are associated with the processes, which are launched by commonly-abused legitimate applications and network-facing applications. This complements the Security Cloud analysis trigger on files with a web download marker. It also augments our behavior monitoring capability with the latest cloud information.
- File and URL reputation queries are done on a new Security Cloud service.
- Performance improvements for real-time scanning.
Version 17.7
Released August 2019
- New Settings user interface
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- A new settings user interface that combines Antivirus and common settings.
- You can view the settings without administrator rights. Editing the settings still requires administrator rights.
- A new Support page containing information, tools, and links that are related to support issues, including your subscription information.
- Logout from SAFE account
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- A logout feature has been added to the main user interface. When you want to switch to a different account, you can use it to log out from your current account and expire the client. You need to log in again to use it.
- Other improvements
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- The usability of the Manage/Renew subscription link has been improved. The SAFE: Manage subscription link opens the SAFE portal and the Internet Security: Manage subscription link is no longer visible.
- The restart prompt has an option to select when to remind you again.
- The recent events view has an option to view events from all users. This requires administrator rights.
Version 17.6
Released April 2019
- Banking protection clears the clipboard
- For added security, all the information is wiped from the clipboard when a banking session ends.
- Restart reminder added
- A reminder is shown if your computer needs to be restarted; for example, after real-time or scheduled scanning has removed a harmful system infection.
- Improved statistics
- The product main page now shows a statistics counter for various security actions, such as files scanned and website reputations checked.
- Other general improvements
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- The Time limits feature has been renamed to Device use limits; the functionality of the feature remains unchanged.
- Croatian language support has been added.
- Some user interfaces have been re-implemented using Microsoft .NET Framework 4.7.2. If you do not have Microsoft .NET Framework 4.7.2 installed, it will be automatically installed during installation/upgrade.
- Overall scanning engine improvements
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- The engine uses the browser's "mark-of-the-web" to decide if a file should be analyzed in the Security Cloud. This improves the detection of potentially unwanted applications.
- Performance improvements to scanning when you install applications.
- Improved website reputation look-ups from the Security Cloud for Browsing Protection.
- Improved reliability for engine updates.
