So my workplace is mostly iPhone users and someone asked me what kind of antivirus software I used on my Android, and I said “none” and he flipped out about how unsafe it was. Other people chimed in saying how all androids need antivirus apps and I’ve never heard of such a thing. I do have ad-blockers and a VPN but never downloaded an antivirus. Should I? If so, what would you recommend? Thanks lemmings, love you.
Absolutely not, that guy is eating marketing
Apple sponsored fear mongering, I’d say. It’s almost like they had an interest in keeping people away from the alternative.
You should never trust an apple user for technology questions. If they knew better, they wouldn’t be using apple devices.
Apple has only proven themselves more secure than the competition in one example: When they protected a criminal from an FBI warrant.
No, antivirus in general is not a good idea these days. It is extremely invasive, consumes resources, and doesn’t actually do much of anything.
Don’t sideload random APKs off the web and you’ll be fine.
There have been far more severe iPhone exploits in the past year or two compared to Android ones.
Apple will never take the brand hit of allowing third party security software, so maybe let your pals know a brand’s fragile ego is putting them in an arguably more perilous position.
Yes, you need antivirus. I recommend using antivirus called common sense.
No and you’re stupid if you do.
Basically due to how locked down phones are compared to computers, it’s nearly impossible (though not impossible) to get a virus. Not only that, but being so locked-down means that even if your anti virus did work, it wouldn’t actually be able to do anything about it. But what an AV can do is read all the data that goes into your phone and collect it for the company to sell it for a profit, and that’s why phone AVs exist.
Computer AVs are already shaky enough as is (McAfee is so insecure that actual hackers use it to get into computers) but there are a lot of cases where they can save your ass due to computers just being pretty insecure in general. I’ve used Malwarebytes twice to save me from dark web viruses, but that was a case where I installed it, ran the scan, killed the virus, then uninstalled. You don’t need one running all the time. In most cases your OS will imply common-sense restrictions if it sees you don’t have an AV and in a lot of cases those end up making your computer way more protected than the security theatre most AVs employ.
Maybe against the grain, here, with all the comments saying No, but: If you were interested in trying something out, I would give Hypatia a go. It’s a FOSS-based app, available on F-droid. It’s basically a ClamAV front-end. Pulls from their signature lists for Android, alongside other more general AV signature lists. Just an option.
Antivirus is badness enumeration. Androids security model is way better than that.
Not really. Especially you stick to trusted app stores. It’s only really needed if you frequently sideload apps, and even then only if you feel it’s necessary.
That being said, Hypatia is a good one I like to use from time to time. It’s FOSS too. You can find it on F-Droid if you use the DivestOS official repo.
No amount of antivirus or alternative OSs will save you from unpatched hardware vulnerabilities though. Visiting a malicious web page or downloading a temporarily hostage app from your favorite app store can be enough to allow the bad guys into your device.
As long as you have a currently supported device and keep it up to date, you shouldn’t ever need antivirus.
AV is no substitute for proper hygiene. Don’t click random links, don’t install random software, use a VPN on untrusted networks, yadda yadda.
I never have. Keep your shit updated, use a digital condom (ad/malware blocker), and dont go to shady websites offering free games and such and you are fine.
It seems based on the comments you don’t.
But I personally use ESET. It did catch a few things a few times. Specifically some of the shady modded APKs, which is expected. VirusTotal.com is also of help with those.
