OPSWAT today announced the release of their latest market share report, which includes detailed analysis of the market share of antivirus vendors and products. The report also takes a look at the use of real time protection (RTP) by users of top antivirus products and the number of devices with persisting threats or potentially unwanted applications (PUAs).
The report includes extensive data on the market share of various antivirus vendors. Market share for the top five antivirus vendors with RTP enabled were as follows:
- Avast – 21.4%
- Microsoft – 19.4%
- AVG – 8.6%
- Avira – 7.4%
- Symantec – 7.1%
Among specific antivirus products, Microsoft Security Essentials had the highest market share, closely followed by avast! Free Antivirus and Avira Free Antivirus.
While the overwhelming majority of devices surveyed had at least one antivirus engine installed, only 8.7% had run a full system scan in the last 7 days, meaning over 90% of devices had not run a full scan in that period, putting them at risk for infection and in possible violation of data security regulations. With new threats introduced on a daily basis, it is important for devices to run frequent system scans to prevent security breaches and the potential loss of valuable data.
The findings also unveiled information on devices with persisting threats or potentially unwanted applications. A persisting threat occurs when files are repeatedly detected by the antivirus engine and continue after efforts have been made to remove or remediate the threat. Of devices surveyed, 0.7% were found to have persisting threats, and 3.3% were found to have threats or PUA’s.
These statistics could have alarming real-world consequences for both individuals and businesses. According to Adam Winn, Product Manager for OPSWAT GEARS, “Installing an antivirus product is the first, not last, step to having a safe and secure computer. According to our data, nine out of ten users haven’t scanned their system in the last week, and another 15% of devices are using outdated antivirus signatures. These stats, combined with the low usage of real-time protection means there’s an alarming number of unprotected computers. Over 3% of devices show some sign of infection, so it’s reasonable to assume in an organization with 400 PCs, a full dozen are compromised!”
For more details on this data, including the complete market share breakdown for top antivirus vendors and products in use among on surveyed devices, please view the full results.
All data in the report was collected by OPSWAT GEARS, an endpoint security management tool with threat detection capabilities. GEARS has the capability to detect and remediate the status of installed applications such as antivirus, hard disk encryption, antiphishing, password protection, and more. The program also allows system administrators to set certain criteria for these devices given access to a network, denying access to unprotected devices. GEARS integrates with Metascan Online’s multi-scanning technology, which utilizes the power of up to 40 antivirus engines to scan for threats. To try the free GEARS tool, please visit opswatgears.com/download.
