Posted 09/21/09 at 03:46:52 PM by Pulkit Chandna

Microsoft opened its gates to public beta testers for its free antivirus solution, Microsoft Security Essentials, on June 23, 2009. Within a day, it managed to get rid of the 75,000 public beta downloads it had made available on a first-come-first-serve basis in the United States, China, Israel and Brazil.

If you missed the bus then, probably due to an obstinate disposition to miss buses, you will soon be able to download the final version of the free antivirus software. The final version will be made available in the next few weeks, according to a note Microsoft sent to beta testers.

“The final version of Microsoft Security Essentials will be released to the public in the coming weeks. If you are running the older version of the beta (1.0.1407.0), we encourage you to upgrade to a newer version of the beta (1.0.1500.0),” Microsoft informed testers on Sunday.

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Posted 07/07/09 at 04:47:52 PM by Pulkit Chandna

Microsoft recently made the Microsoft Security Essentials beta available for download. When Microsoft first announced that it had a free antivirus software in the works, Symantec and MacAfee shares immediately plunged. Both the antivirus developers are not ready to acknowledge MSE as a threat to their paid offerings.

David Hall, a regional product manager at Symantec, unleashed a diatribe against MSE while speaking to BLORGE. He believes MSE is not a consummate product and cannot fully protect users. “If you are only relying on free antivirus to offer you protection in this modern age, you are not getting the protection you need to be able to stay clean and have a reasonable chance of avoiding identity theft,” Hall said. He even ridiculed MSE as “a stripped down version of the OneCare product.”

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