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SAN DIEGO, Calif. – (December 5, 2005) – A study conducted by AV-Comparatives.org revealed that of the eight new viruses that have been released In-the-Wild in the past three months, customers of Symantec, Trend Micro and Kaspersky had proactive detection for none of these threats, leaving them at risk until the vendors could provide a signature update. McAfee customers were only protected from a single virus without updating. ESET’s NOD32 customers were protected four times more often against new viruses, and 95% more often across all new samples used in the test, including In-the-Wild threats, backdoors, Trojans and other malware. This is the second study conducted by AV-Comparatives.org on this topic in 2005. Over the course of both studies, NOD 32 proactively detected 50 out of 59 In-the-Wild samples used, or 85%.

“Zero-day attacks by definition include new malware, and with so many out there, users need to know that they have a superior level of proactive protection to prevent infection,” said Andrew Lee, chief technology officer of ESET.  “The AV-Comparatives.org test proves that ESET’s NOD32 continues to provide the best proactive protection on the market.”
 
The AV-Comparatives.org “Retrospective/Proactive Test” compared 11 different antivirus products’ abilities to proactively identify the increasing complexity and zero-day nature of today’s threats. The independent testing institution AV-Comparatives.org is an antivirus research project coordinated by Andreas Clementi with the support of the Innsbrucker Kompetenzzentrum / Computernotdienst. The stringent testing used recent In-the-Wild samples and a variety of other malware, Trojans, viruses and worms affecting Windows and other operating systems. To effectively test the products for proactive detection, the organization used new malware samples received between August and November 2005, and tested them against the products without updating the antivirus signature. More details can be found at http://www.av-comparatives.org/.

This study, and others like it, emphasize that proactive detection is increasingly important as the threat window becomes smaller. With new threats appearing every day, it is important that antivirus companies not only provide new updates to identify these threats once they are released, but also are able to detect threats proactively through advanced heuristics. Without proactive heuristic detection, users must wait for updated versions of their antivirus software, creating a critical window of vulnerability that can last hours or even days. ESET’s NOD32 is the only product on the market today that utilizes advanced heuristics technology to proactively catch more than 90 percent of unknown malware. In this particular test, NOD32 detected four of the sample set of eight new In-the-Wild viruses.

"New types of viruses and malware appear everyday, making it imperative that the AV solutions on the market not only provide quick updates but also detect and protect against threats in advance with heuristic techniques," said Andreas Clementi, project manager of AV-Comparatives.org. "In our November independent test looking at proactive detection capabilities, we tested 11 of the world's top AV solutions and once again ESET's NOD32 detected more new malware than any other vendor—providing excellent proactive on-demand detection."

NOD32 utilizes ThreatSense® technology, a sophisticated detection system based on advanced heuristics, to proactively identify previously-unknown malware in real-time.  ThreatSense is built into NOD32’s single, unified scanning engine to provide comprehensive protection so users do not need to rely on additional point solutions for spyware and adware protection.  Additionally, network and system performance is barely affected for end-users and IT administrators as NOD32 uses less than 20 MB of memory.

About ESET
Founded in 1992, ESET is a global provider of security software solutions for enterprises and consumers. ESET’s award-winning, anti-threat software system, NOD32, provides real-time protection from known and unknown viruses, spyware and other malware.  NOD32 offers the smallest, fastest and most advanced protection available, with more Virus Bulletin 100% Awards than any other antivirus product (www.virusbulletin.com). ESET was named to Deloitte’s Technology Fast 500 three years running, and has an extensive partner network, including corporations like Canon, Dell and Microsoft.  ESET has offices in San Diego, USA, Bratislava, SK, London, UK, Prague, CZ and is represented worldwide in more than 80 countries. For more information, visit www.eset.com or call 619-319-3000.