What is cloud based Antivirus for Windows ?

By Windows Club | June 20th, 2010

A cloud-based antivirus software does not store the virus definitions on your Windows computer. Rather than using your computer’s processing power, this cloud based antivirus sends data about potentially malicious files to the company’s servers for analysis. This approach is intended to take advantage of the latest signatures without the need for signature-database updates.

Cloud Antivirus is a free cloud-based antivirus from Panda!It was the first cloud-based antivirus to have been released!

Features:

• Behavioural blocking. Proactive, signature-less, protection against malicious actions typically used by malware. Generic blocking of malicious PDF/DOC/XLS/PPT/WMV/etc. droppers. Compatible with both 32 and 64bit Windows Operating Systems.
• Behavioral analysis (PRO only). Runtime analysis and blocking of running processes. Compatible with 32bits Operating Systems as well as for 32bit processes under 64bit systems.
• Advanced configuration. Ability to turn on/off and tweak the behaviour of the different engines, cloud responses, advanced logging, recycle bin settings, exclusions, etc.
• Self-protection of the AV processes and configurations.
• Re-do detections that were previously un-done so that they are detected again.
• And more

One question which could arise in a users mind is that would he or she be still protected when not connected to the Internet?
“Yes, you do not need to be connected to the Internet all the time in order to be protected. Cloud Antivirus stores a “local cache copy” of Collective Intelligence for offline operation. As soon as you disconnect, Cloud Antivirus still works in the background, checking every file against its local cache of detections. This local cache includes, amongst other things, detection for all malware files which are currently in circulation and affecting users.”

Cloud Antivirus from Panda, is compatible with other antivirus software and is available in two flavors: Free Edition and Pro.

There is also another cloud based antivirus security software, Immunet Protect, now available, which gives you a fast, extra layer of protection that won’t slow down your PC.

I really like the idea and seems very cool. One thing that comes to mind though is privacy.

For example, suppose you open a text file called "MyPrivateInfoNobodyShouldKnow.txt."

Now, will this file or even just its name be sent across the net? If so, unencrypted or encrypted?


I honestly don't know how this works, but can see privacy-minded people not wanting to use this if privacy is at risk in this nature.