Microsoft antispyware beta 2 tests

Last month I mentioned the release of the latest beta version of Microsoft’s free anti-spyware program, Windows Defender [1], and said I’d have some test results for you this month. Well, testing this thing has proved a pain as it only runs under Windows XP SP2 while all my VMWare test machines are unpatched Windows XP. This means I’ve had to build a new VMWare test environment and re-run tests on all anti-spyware products in that environment. I’m only about a third of the way through this huge job but early results suggest Windows Defender may provide the best protection against spyware of any of the free anti- spyware programs but falls behind the top commercial products such as WebRoot SpySweeper. These results are preliminary and I may have to eat my words when I complete the tests. Free beta software, Windows 2000 SP4, Windows XP SP2, 4.3 MB
[1] http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx

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