Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Monday, 10 March 2008 10:59
Opinion and Analysis
Page 1 of 2
Anti-virus and anti-malware makers ALWIL Software, well known for the
avast! line of software for consumers, business and enterprise, have
reported a treasure trove of 50 million users being protected by avast!
Antivirus.
50 million users is nothing to be sneezed at, even if a good proportion of those users likely come from the fact that
avast!, like
Grisoft with its AVG software, offer a free anti-virus solution to home users – a clever tactic used to get the product out there and hopefully used as paid versions by consumers, businesses and enterprise customers.
The first avast! Antivirus registration took place in January 2002, the 20 millionth took place in October 2006, 25 million users were registered in February 2007, it grew to 30 million in May 2007 and by October 2007 there were 40 million users – although just how many of the now 50 million users are actually still using avast! and haven’t moved onto other platforms is either unknown, or unreported.
Available for PC, Linux and Mac platforms, avast! certainly is a popular anti-virus package, and certainly indicates how successful the policy of offering a free home user version for non-commercial use can be to boost the rest of the business.
Eduard Kucera, ALWIL Software joint founder and CEO said, "This is a major achievement for all of the hardworking team at ALWIL Software, showing that dedication to offering a best-in-class antivirus can pay off both for us as a team, and for our user base. With fifty million concurrent users of avast!, we can demonstrate that we are doing our job well, and our users agree."
Kucera continued that: "However, we are not resting or complacent in our approach to malware protection - in the soon to be released version 4.8 of avast! Antivirus, we have added anti-spyware capability, certified by West Coast Labs Checkmark certification process and anti-rootkit protection, as well as very strong self-protection of the product itself.
Speaking of the future, and outlining an upcoming avast! version 5, Kucera said that: "In the year ahead, we will continue to offer the best protection our users have come to expect from avast!, as well as continuing to develop avast! Antivirus to offer the additional features that our users are demanding, culminating in the release of avast! 5 towards the end of Q3 2008. We genuinely look forward to better serving our users and customers in everything that we do."
Please continue reading on page 2.
