14 DAY TRIAL // Tests carried out on four security programs have reportedly nabbed Intego a crown, with its VirusBarrier X6 antivirus software detecting 633 pieces of malware, or 99.69% of the total 635 samples.
On its blog, Intego touts VirusBarrier X6 as “a tool to protect Macs from the dangers of the Internet,” although the software has “the ability to spot and eradicate Windows malware as well,” the security firm notes.
“There are two reasons for this. First, many Mac users run Windows on their Macs using Apple’s Boot Camp or virtualization programs such as VMWare Fusion or Parallels Desktop,” Intego elaborates.
“Second, Mac users regularly interact with Windows users, sharing files in both directions,” the self-touted Mac security expert says.
“Especially in an enterprise environment, it is essential to spot malware before it gets to the computers it can affect, and VirusBarrier X6 does this by ensuring that Mac users don’t propagate malware to Windows-using colleagues,” the introduction ends.
Intego finally gets to the point, saying that “French web sit clubic.com ran a long article about Mac security, looking at the issues facing Macs and the tools that protect them.”
The security firm was happy to learn that, after trying out four Mac anti-malware programs to see how good they were at detecting Windows malware, VirusBarrier X6 was listed as “the clear winner,” Intego outlines.
VirusBarrier X6 detected 633 samples, or 99.69%, out of 635 tested.
“Drats; we’re trying to find out which two samples we missed so we can do better next time,” Intego brags.
“The second-placed program wasn’t even close. With only 573 detections, it missed 60 of the test samples, for only a 90% detection rate,” it points out to those following the Intego Mac Security Blog.
Softpedia note
It is worth noting that, with over 100,000 unique samples emerging on a daily basis, the results following tests on some 600 samples isn’t exactly what security experts would call "relevant statistics."
Furthermore, this test involved an on-demand scan, which at best is relevant only for the signature-based detection.
Most anti-malware products today have advanced layers of protection like behavioral-based or cloud-based detection components.