F-Secure Anti-Virus stands among the mainstream PC protection software available in the market. Founded in 1988, the company is headquartered in Helsinki in Finland and has offices in around 25 countries. This company has a revenue of over 158 million euros according to statistics from the year 2016

On top of that, F-Secure Anti-Virus claims to provide netizens with superior privacy and data protection. The company has sworn to serve tens of millions of consumers and over 100,000 corporate customers worldwide. Having said that, this F-Secure Antivirus review will unveil whether F-Secure is a worthy and reliable provider or not. We will find out how F-Secure antivirus utilizes two anti-malware engines, browser spam filters, and parental controls to protect users effectively.

To provide our readers with an impartial and unbiased review of F-Secure, we have highlighted the missing features and areas of improvement for this anti-virus software. Read along to discover everything about F-Secure Anti-Virus.

Pricing Plans and Featured Offerings

F-Secure’s pricing plans are rather interesting. While many popular antivirus companies charge more than $50/month for a similar level of protection, F-Secure offers economical programs.

There are two preliminary plans that you can choose from depending on what your requirements are. If you are someone who only uses one PC, whether it is for work or your personal use, then you can choose the one-year package offered by F Secure that starts at $39.99.

But if you wish to obtain security for the PCs of everyone in your home, say your wife and kids, then it would a package offered by F Secure that will allow you to protect 3 PCs for up to a year will only cost you $39.99.

The standard plan is ideal for the average user using it on a single PC. However, the antivirus lacks a password manager and file shredder, which would certainly be a downside. But we must mention that the software ensures the optimal level of protection against ransomware, malware, and zero-day-exploit, justifying the price it charges.

F-Secure has kept things distinct and offered its users the F-Secure Internet Security package separately. The internet security plan aims to protect users’ online activities by providing URL scanners, home-network scanners, and parental controls. On top of all this, the internet security plan benefits those who perform online transactions regularly.

F-Secure Antivirus Protection

“In AV-Tests, a Windows 10 system was subjected to over 1.5 million malware. But, F-Secure stopped about 100% of zero-day-threats successfully.”

F-Secure’s Anti-Virus offers three layers of security to the users that include malware-signature matching. In addition, the software provides you with an in-house developed signature scanner and database along with a licensed one from third-party applications.

As a result, subscribers get a more advanced, efficient, and powerful threats detection system. Besides, we researched verdicts of well-acclaimed testing labs and discovered startling results about F-Secure.

According to AV-Tests performed every month, F-Secure’s protection rates are astounding. However, some false positives were reported by F-Secure on operating systems older than Windows 10.

On the other hand, F-Secure offers 100% protection against a wide range of malicious programs, modern-day viruses, malware, and zero-day-exploit. Apart from this, F-Secure performed better than other popular antivirus programs that charge a lot more.

F-Secure Security and Privacy Features

Irrefutably, F-Secure offers several essential features, but one shouldn’t expect a lot of them. Considering the economic plans and affordability aspects of F-Secure, the program provides full-fledged antivirus scanning and a sleek interface to manage users’ needs.

The interface comes with two buttons, a virus scanner, and settings. On top of that, the software interface isn’t bombarded with detailed options and complexities that might confuse users, ensuring that users of all experience levels can easily use the software.

You can find additional features under tools if you are a tech geek. Other features include system check-ups, rootkit scanning, logs, scheduled scanning, quarantine management, and more settings. F-Secure security should not be considered an amateur in the market as it is a reliable and worthy protection tool.

F-Secure DeepGuard

When counting on the F-Secure’s security features, we can’t miss highlighting the F-Secure DeepGuard. DeepGuard is a cloud-based system that aims to detect the modern-day threats and vulnerabilities that users may face.

Users can optimize this feature and use the F-Secure to demand permission whenever a suspicious and untrusted program tries to infect their system through the internet. F-Secures allows users to alter the view and list of monitored apps.

Scanning – How fast is F-Secure?

F-Secure lacks features such as URL blocking, but the Antivirus makes no compromise regarding fast scanning of the user’s device.

The antivirus software ensures blazing fast scanning with an elegantly designed interface. Putting it simply, F-Secure is the quicker and smarter choice for users who require accuracy and speed over add-on features.

F-Secure Browser Extension

F-Secure Antivirus quickly offers a secure browser extension for all popular internet browsers. Users of Microsoft Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, and Google Chrome can install this extension for protective browsing.

However, the extension isn’t offered for Opera and Microsoft Edge. The extension uses F-Secure’sSafeSearch to identify the threat a website may bring to the device before opening it for the users.

F-Secure Anti-Virus Firewall

F-Secure doesn’t offer user devices a personal firewall. However, the Antivirus makes use of the built-in firewall in Windows. This way, the F-Secure ensures safe and secure online transactions for all its users.

The users looking for a Virtual Private Network can achieve impregnable data privacy and robust online protection with F-Secure’s VPN Client called Freedom. The password manager provided by F-Secure for additional cost offers security to users’ credentials.

To test the resource and memory allocation of F-Secure on a system, we installed it on a laptop running Windows 10 with a Core i3 processor, 300GB worth of storage, and 6GB RAM. While testing, we identified that the Antivirus consumes many resources to accomplish the job.

We ran an image-loading app with F-Secure working in the background. The app took around 2-3 minutes extra when F-Secure scanned for threats and viruses in the environment.

F-Secure does put a load on the system on which it is being run, but that’s inevitable when having an antivirus protects you all the time. But it would help if you did not forget that F-Secure’s virus scanning is considered among the fastest antivirus scanning to date.

The User Panel

It cannot be denied that the user interface of any software serves as the first impression of any antivirus software, and F-Secure believes in keeping a sleek interface as simple as possible. Their interface offers a radar scanning representation to their users. As F-Secure performs scanning, a bar goes through a circle highlighting both safe and malicious threats on the system.

On the main window, subscribers are displayed with scanning and setting options.

You will find that there are tabs for Tools and Statistics. Tools encompass features such as DeepGuard and Quarantined files. On top, it allows the subscriber to scan any suspicious file or malware. Also, users can turn off the protective features of F-Secure from tools whenever they see fit.

The Statistics section represents results from all of the scans in graphical form. Apart from this, F-Secure offers a free rescue disk to be burned on a CD or USB drive.

Installation Process

The overall installation process is simple and takes no longer than 5-7 minutes on average. To begin downloading F-Secure on your system, you can visit their website. Unlike other competitor software sites, they use no cheap tricks such as pop-up ads and banners for other premium products before downloading F-Secure Antivirus. In addition, the software won’t change your homepage or default search engine to theirs.

If you are unsure whether or not you need virus protection, F Secure offers you a 30-day trial period to make up your mind. Once you are set up, this software can quickly scan as many as 1500 items, all in under a minute!

F-Secure Support System

Undeniably, responsive customer support plays a vital role when choosing reliable antivirus software. Apart from all the security features, level of protection, and add-ons, subscribers get the opportunity to opt for a provider who is present to answer their queries at times.

F-Secure believes in offering superior customer services at all times and thus provides four channels for customer support. Following are the customer support channels that we discovered while creating this F-Secure Anti-Virus review:

• Frequently Asked Question – FAQs Section

The FAQs section encompasses all the queries faced by users; Subscribers can find information about F-Secure Safe, Freedom, Key, Total, Sense, Business Security Suite, and many other products of the company. Not only this, but subscribers can also find information on F-Secure on iOS and Android apps in their FAQs section.

• Forum and Community Network

F-Secure has set itself apart from other providers by maintaining a community forum with thousands of posts about diverse cyber-security issues. The forums section provides basic details about digital security, business, and corporate security, beta versions of the software, and insights about upcoming cyber security products.

Not only this, but there’s a speakers corner in the community section that covers all the off-topic discussions, such as improving the responsiveness of Google Chrome, Outlook, iOS apps, Android apps, and more.

• Customer Support System

F-Secure offers a customer support system only available during standard working hours. The customer support system can be accessed by clicking on the Support tab.

• Helpline

The support helpline serves as the first channel of support when an issue presents to a user. F-Secure offers a helpline available from 9 am to 6 pm, Monday to Friday, and Eastern Time. The helpline numbers for respective regions are available in the call support section on their Support page.

F-Secure for Windows

Microsoft Windows stands as the most adapted operating system around the world. With millions of users worldwide, the mainstream platform is prone to various viruses, malware, worms, ransomware, zero-day-exploit, brute force attempts, and other rising cyber threats.

F-Secure for Windows offers security against malicious viruses that could infect your files, photos, and other essential documents. F-Secure application for Windows is available on the official site of the provider. However, it is only available for Windows 10, 8.1, and 7. In addition, tablets based on ARM don’t support F-Secure.

F-Secure for Mac

Mac OSX has been considered the most secure operating system to date. However, the recent zero-day-exploit that infected thousands of Mac OSX users around the globe has proven that the security of Mac OSX can be compromised.

Thus, F-Secure offers impregnable protection to Mac OSX users while they surf the web, watch videos, download files and make online transactions. F-Secure for Mac is available on their website.

F-Secure Android/apps

Mobile devices are the most used gadgets in the contemporary digital world. Regardless of how much ease these devices brought to humanity, mobile devices are more often subjected to cyber-attacks. Android and iOS devices have compromised security when targeted by malicious hackers.

F-Secure offers a security suite for both devices, ensuring netizens are safe at all times. The F-Secure app for iOS and Android devices can be downloaded from iTunes and Play Store.

F-Secure Antivirus – Final Thoughts

Our F-Secure Antivirus review has revealed in-depth information about F-Secure’s offerings, features, level of protection, and security against a wide range of threats and vulnerabilities. It would help if you had a quality antivirus that won’t slow your PC down as you work. While most antivirus software in the market tends to make your device lag, the same cannot be said for F Secure. F Secure was rated the Best Antivirus Software for Windows Home User in the AV-Test of April 2007. Not only this, but it was also ranked 5th out of 15 in PassMark Software’s March Consumer Security Products report.

F-Secure is one of the most robust antivirus software in the market, with a twin-engine for malware protection. Affordability and ease of use make F-Secure an intelligent choice for average and advanced users. While it could make advancements by introducing URL blocking and some other bonus features, we can easily rate this a 9 out of 10 in our review. This software is not only fast but also convenient, easy on your system, affordable, and easy to use and understand.

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