The Security Essentials Pack is Microsoft’s most recent effort to improve the security of their operating system. This is Microsoft’s replacement for the Windows Live OneCare software which was discontinued months ago. And while the OneCare software was fairly cheap, the Security Essentials Pack is free. The features will include key security tasks such as fighting viruses, rootkits and other malware. However, it will not provide any firewall or spam protection.
Lets hope the performance of the Security Essentials Pack is better than OneCare. While OneCare might have been protecting your computer, it also performed so poorly that you could definitely tell that it was there. Security software like this should be lightweight enough that you can set it up and forget that it is even there and it just does its job.
Microsoft is also doing the right thing with the Security Essentials Pack by allowing it to tap into the potential of cloud-base services. Most security software applications are stuck in the days of periodically downloading updated virus definitions. Microsoft Security Essentials will share information with the cloud-based Microsoft Dynamic Signature Service which should allow the software to always be aware of the latest threats as well as whitelist information in order to prevent false positives. They are not the first antivirus software to utilize the cloud but it is certainly a welcomed addition to any security software that relies on being up-to-date in order to be fully effective.
