Hiplok: A Wearable Bike Lock That's Not Just For Tattooed Hipsters

by Lloyd Alter, Toronto

from http://www.treehugger.com/

Images Credit Hiplok
The weight of a bike lock is inversely proportional to the weight of your bike, and directly proportional to the cost. They are also a pain to store on the bike, and I often sling my heavy duty cable lock across my shoulders; No doubt it will garrote me in an accident some day. But now Industrial designers John Abrahams and Benjamin Smith have solved the problem with the very ingenious Hiplok.

 

 

The designers call it " the world's first bicycle lock developed specifically to be worn on the body." It is adjustable and easily put on or removed, much like an airline seat belt mechanism. The weight of the lock is on your hips, so it is much more stable. The graphic is highly reflective. it is also safer than throwing it over your shoulder:

If you've ever worn a chain lock or flexible lock on your body, you'll know that you have to lock it in place in order for it to stay in position. This is not very safe if you, or somebody helping you, needs to take off the lock in an emergency situation. Due to it's unique design, Hiplok is never locked into a loop while it is attached to your body, and it remains fully adjustable and quickly removable at all times when being worn.

No doubt a lot of readers are wondering why anyone would wear their lock instead of just putting it on the bike. There are a couple of reasons; when you are starting and stopping a lot, it is faster that wrapping the chain around the seatpost. It doesn't scratch the bike. If you have to carry the bike at all (going multi-modal or climbing stairs) it makes the bike a lot easier to carry. (chains can weigh a couple of pounds).

So ignore all the tattoo photos, this is not a hipster affectation, it is a good idea and I want one. £69.99 at Hiplok, found on TrendsNow. 

The science of password selection

From: http://www.troyhunt.com/

A little while back I took a look at some recently breached accounts and wrote A brief Sony password analysis. The results were alarming; passwords were relatively short (usually 6 to 10 characters), simple (less than 1% had a non-alphanumeric character) and predictable (more than a third were in a common password dictionary). What was even worse though was uniqueness; 92% of common accounts in the Sony systems reused passwords and even when I looked at a totally unrelated system – Gawker – reuse was still very high with over two thirds of common email addresses sharing the same password.
But there was one important question I left unanswered and that was how people choose their passwords. We now know that structurally, passwords almost always adhere to what we would consider “bad practices” but how are these passwords derived in the first place? What’s the personal significance which causes someone to choose a particular password?
It turns out there are some very recognisable patterns in the data. In fact the vast majority of passwords adhere to just a small handful of common selection practices. This is interesting research in that it begins to give a bit of insight into the thought process of the individuals who create passwords which conform to weak structural guidelines.

Source data and analysis process

The data I’m going to analyse comes from a variety of sources including the Sony and Gawker breaches I referenced in the previous post as well as other LulzSec releases including pron.com and a collection of their random logins. For each of these I have nothing more than an email address and a password – there are no other account attributes I can use to start drawing conclusions (i.e. physical address). There are about 300,000 accounts in all which should give us a reasonable cross section with which to make some observations on password selection.
There are three other sets of source data I’m going to use in this analysis:

1. People names: this includes a list of about 26,000 common first and last names.
2. Place names: this is everything from towns to states to countries and includes about 32,000 entries.
3. English dictionary: exactly what it sounds like – around 190,000 words in a typical English dictionary.

I’m going to use these three sources of data to make some assumptions about where passwords may have been derived from. The three lists above are aggregated from various sources and whilst comprehensive, are certainly by no means complete. The bottom line is that some potential matches are going to be missed and the overall numbers will be lower than what they would be if the lists were 100% accurate.
In matching passwords to potential sources I’m going to be a bit more liberal than usual by ignoring both case and punctuation. Whilst these are extremely important to password entropy, they don’t have a part to play in terms of where people derive their password from. Whether I use “Troy” or “troy” as a password (and no, I don’t use either!), or “Troy Hunt” or “troyhunt”, I’ve still derived them from the same logical source. Besides, in my previous analysis 45% of all passwords contained only lowercase characters and as I mentioned earlier, less than 1% had any sort of punctuation anyway so it wouldn’t make a difference for a significant portion of the data set.
In the analysis I’m going to start with the most personal sources – such as someone’s name – and then move onto increasingly less personal sources such as places, then dictionary words and see how many passwords correlate to each. In a case like “June” where it could be either a name or a dictionary word, it will appear in whichever statistics I run first (people names, in this case), then won’t be counted again so we’ll get a discrete set of matches. The order of the results is more a logical priority than one of prevalence.

People names

I’ve started with people names because a name is simply one of the most personal attributes of someone’s identity. I also suspect they feature heavily when someone reaches into the recesses of their mind to come up with a password. Now of course the name is not necessarily the name of the account holder; it could be a spouse, the kids or even the family dog. Furthermore, it could be a first name, a middle name or a last name.
Here’s how they break down in terms of their prevalence within the total password set:

Passwords derived from a person’s name

So what this graph is saying is that 14% of people create their password based on a person’s name. What does this look like? Well, pretty predictable really, here are the top three names as passwords:

1. maggie
2. michael
3. jennifer

But there’s a bit more to the story; just because a password is derived from a person’s name doesn’t mean it’s a perfect match. For example, prepending or appending numbers to a name is a popular practice so whilst “troy21” may not be a perfect match to my name, the origin of it is still clear.
There are three common derivatives of a name which frequently appear in passwords:

1. The addition of numbers
2. The addition of symbols (possibly along with numbers)
3. Reversing the name (with or without numbers and symbols)

The graph above includes these three practices and the propensity of them within people names breaks down as follows:

Structure of passwords derived from people names

Obviously numbers are the favourites and they’re almost exclusively appended to the name rather than prepended. Furthermore, the appended number is very, very frequently just a “1”. Two digit numbers, likely representing a year, also feature quite frequently (year of birth, perhaps?) as do four digit numbers which I assume would imply the same thing (certainly it’s feasible based on the number range).
Use of symbols is quite rare but then again, as I mentioned right at the start of this post, less than 1% of passwords in my previous analysis had a symbol anyway so no big surprises there. The reversed names are obviously an attempt to obfuscate the password and decrease discoverability. In reality, a reversed name is still the same number and type of characters so passwords such as “trebor”, “nevets” and “samoht” are still going to be very vulnerable to brute force attacks such as by rainbow table.

Place names

Another very common practice is to use the name of a place in the password. This might be a city, a state or a country and it’s probably fair to speculate that these places have some degree of personal significance to the password creator. Here’s how prevalent those place names are:

Passwords derived from a place name

What we’re seeing here is that 8% of all passwords are based on a place name. The most popular place names included:

1. dallas
2. canada
3. boston

The trick with place names is that very often they could also be people names (i.e. Victoria), which is not surprising given many places are named after people. Likewise, they’re very frequently dictionary names (i.e. Sunshine) and in both cases it’s simply impossible to make an assumption about what the individual was thinking when the password was created. Either way though, the central theme is still the same: the passwords are being derived from common words.
In terms of numbers, symbols and reversing tricks, it’s a pretty consistent result with what we saw previously with people names:

Structure of passwords derived from place names

Once again, the old faithful “1” suffix is most popular. It’s as though people know they should mix character types but they take the easy way out instead of choosing truly random numbers and positioning them at unpredictable locations within the password.

Dictionary words

Here’s the big one, and it’s not at all surprising given the huge selection available. Dictionary words are by far and away the most popular source of password inspiration:

Passwords derived from a dictionary word

A huge 25% of passwords are derived directly from dictionary words. In reality, it’s probably somewhat higher than this as my dictionary had less than a couple of hundred thousand words. And they’re all only English language.
Top among the dictionary favourites are:

1. password (oh dear)
2. monkey
3. dragon

The first one probably shouldn’t be such a surprise but still, wow! My password source of several hundred thousand accounts had nearly two and a half thousand “password” passwords which is not only a pretty poor choice given its clearly available in a dictionary, it’s also an insanely obvious one.
It’s a pretty similar story to people names and places when it comes to mixing up words with a bit of randomness:

Structure of passwords derived from dictionary words

Same deal as before too – predominantly suffixes and predominantly predictable number patterns. I think we’re seeing a pattern here…

Numbers

Here’s another significant portion of passwords – numbers. I don’t mean numbers combined with words, I mean numbers and only numbers. In fact they feature rather significantly:

Passwords derived from numbers

A total of 14% of passwords are purely numeric. If that seems kind of staggeringly high to you, wait until you see the three most popular number combinations:

1. 123456
2. 12345678
3. 123456789

I don’t think we need to do much speculating about how these were derived. What’s a little more interesting though is the spread of lengths:

Length of purely numeric passwords

Why is this interesting? Well firstly, within a spread of numeric password lengths which range from 1 (yes, 1, and there’s a heap of ‘em) to 21, 83% of the passwords are either four, six or eight digits long. Is this a propensity for even numbered password lengths or something else?
For four digit passwords, the spread is pretty widely distributed in terms of number of occurrence, at least once you ignore “1234” (the most commonly used four digit password by a factor of ten). However, there’s quite a prevalence of numbers which could easily represent recent years (1984 is quite popular), so I suspect there’s often a date based significance. The other thing to consider is that given the propensity for password reuse and the fact that many PIN numbers are four digits, there’s a good chance these numbers are used on someone’s luggage or – gasp! – is the one they use to pull money from an ATM.
The thing about six digit numbers is that they very, very frequently represent dates in DDMMYY format (or MMDDYY for the Americans). The ranges of each three pairs of numbers in the password list suggest there’s a high likelihood that these passwords do indeed relate to dates, assumedly of some personal significance to the creator.
So what about the high prevalence of eight digit numbers? There’s some degree of numbers meeting a DDMMYYYYY format (or American equivalent), but for the most part, there’s no obvious pattern. Based on what we’ve seen so far there’s almost certainly a personal significance to the numbers but it’s not obvious from their format, at least not beyond those that adhere to obvious, memorable patterns such as “12345678” or “11223344”.
It might seem a bit liberal having a dedicated category for all passwords of one character type, but when you consider the extremely limited character set – ten as opposed to 95 (printable ASCII characters) – there’s obviously some very specific reasons for only choosing numbers.

Double words

We’re getting into the more abstract patterns here but one which does occur quite a bit is double words (i.e. “troytroy”):

Passwords comprised of double words

Again, we’re talking small numbers now, and less than 3% hardly sets the world on fire, but there’s a clear pattern nonetheless. Here’s what’s popping up most frequently:

1. blahblah
2. poopoo
3. lovelove

As well as repeating words, there are also patterns of doubling up on other random characters. We could speculate the thought process is that this practice is enabling simple passwords of very short length to be literally doubled in size, but of course in many cases, they’re still short (eight characters or less), lowercase alphanumeric strings which is a pretty basic pattern.

Passwords found within email addresses

This is a pretty brazen attempt at simplifying the whole logon process – why struggle to remember a password when you can simply use the identity component of the email address? Confused? It would be like me taking the “troyhunt” out of troyhunt@hotmail.com and using that as my password. There’s a bit of that going on here:

Passwords derived from the email address

Ok, less than 3% is a small number but again – wow! – people actually do this! Let me illustrate with the domain excluded so there’s some degree of privacy retained:

1. Email: murphy666@… Password: murphy666
2. Email: baolihua@… Password: baolihua
3. Email: racecar73@… Password: racecar73

The inspiration for these passwords is pretty clear – no more speculation needed!

Short phrases

This one is a little tricky to quantify as the only way of identifying the phrases was to literally eyeball the data and build up a phrase list based of the most common occurrences. However, I thought it was worthwhile pursuing and whilst the numbers below are inevitably lower than the true number (I didn’t read through every password), I know from previous experience that short phrases are often – and incorrectly – thought to be a “secure” form of password. Here’s what I found:

Passwords that are short phrases

What sort of phrases are we looking at? Here’s the most popular few:

1. trustno1
2. letmein
3. iloveyou

The first one is a little amusing given the context and that it appeared as agent Fox Mulder’s password in the X-Files series (not a great password role model!) The others are obviously simple and easy to remember which is a pattern repeated throughout most of the remaining phrases. Yes, they add length and variety (at least in a dictionary sense), but once again, they’re short, predominantly alphabet-centric lowercase passwords. The other thing is that they’re frequently found in password dictionaries (note – not English dictionaries, rather lists of common passwords). In fact “letmein” and “iloveyou” can both be fund in the popular darkc0de.lst password dictionary.

Keyboard patterns

Whilst we’re now getting down into small numbers, keyboard patterns have long been advocated by some as a “secure” means of creating passwords. The theory is that they don’t appear in English language dictionaries (although they often do in password dictionaries), and they’re easy to remember as they’re pattern based. Here’s how they features in the data set:

Passwords that are keyboard patterns

Again, this was based on me manually identifying patterns so inevitably I’ve missed a few but certainly I’ve caught a lot of the high frequency ones. Here’s the sort of patterns I’m regularly seeing:

1. qwerty
2. asdfgh
3. asdf1234

Obviously in a case like the last example, they’re trying to mix things up a little but the pattern is still very clear:

Some of the more creative ones start to take different directions across the keyboard or add a bit of randomness to the recurrence of letters and numbers but the practice remains the same: predictable.

Related to the site

Whilst this is a very small result in terms of percentages, I thought it was a pattern worth commenting on as it’s quite a different approach to deriving a password. In this pattern, the password has a very direct link to the site in which it’s created, either based on name or other attributes relating to the nature of the site. Here’s how it breaks down:

Passwords related to the site they're created on

Let me put this into context:

1. Site: Gawker Password: Gawker
2. Site: Sony Pictures Password: sony123
3. Site: pron.com Password: ilovepron

So once again we have password that are easy to recall based on a memorable attribute. Of course this is also a rather obvious attribute (it’s staring you in the face when you go to logon), and on that basis alone, it really doesn’t form a very robust password. Incidentally, some of these are rather amusing, particularly the ones from pron.com :)

Everything else

So what does that leave? Well, a rather large number of passwords which don’t comply with recognisable patterns or they simply slipped through my filters (the latter is highly likely and there would be a significant number of passwords in this category). Here’s what’s left:

Passwords not derived from sources in the above analysis

High prevalence, typical examples include:

1. thx1138 (turns out this is a movie from forty years back)
2. gundam (actually an anime series)
3. ncc1701 (codename for the USS Enterprise in Star Trek)

So there’s a whole range of passwords out there which whilst they won’t be picked up by any of the patterns discussed above, do in fact relate to popular culture. This is a fairly obvious source of inspiration although one that’s difficult to define in a set word list.
Then of course there are simply passwords which don’t adhere to any discoverable pattern, for example “mw818283” (although interestingly a Google search does show this up in an online password dictionary). The thing is though, these fall into the minority and even if they are “strong” (long, random, unique), they’re now commonly available in password dictionaries to be used in future brute force attacks. Because my entire password database has come from compromised sites which are now readily available online, the reality is that none of these passwords should be used again. Ever.

Summary

So what do we make of all this? There are some obvious conclusions:

1. Passwords are inspired by words of personal significance or other memorable patterns.
2. Attempts to obfuscate or strengthen passwords usually follow predictable patterns.
3. Truly random passwords are all but non-existent – they’re less than 1% of the data set.

A significant part of the problem is clearly websites implementing very lax password policies (or none at all based on the one character instances), where at the very least, there should be a robust minimum criteria. How high should the bar be set? Well, that’s another topic of much debate and there are obvious usability implications. Then there’s the idea of taking password requirements to a whole new level and doing what Hotmail has just done by actively disallowing vulnerable passwords.
But the intention of this post was always to identify how people are presently choosing their passwords and we have good insight into that now. Of course the next question is “how should people be choosing passwords”? The answer to this is simple: The only secure password is the one you can’t remember.

10 Most Secure Locations on the Planet

From: http://www.brownsafe.com/

They say safety is relative. Some people go their entire lives and NEVER feel safe. Others take incredible precautions to protect both themselves and their loved ones from anyone and anything that may seek to cause them harm (babyproofing anyone?).

Where are you most safe? Are you thinking about places where you can retreat and hide from the world? If so, here are the 10 Most Secure Locations on the Planet that are considered the safest, for various reasons.

1. Fort Knox

Located in Kentucky south of Louisville, Fort Knox is home to the United States’ monetary assets, said to hold tons of gold – 5,000 tons at last estimate (equal to about 2% of ALL Gold ever mined from the Earth). To make it safe enough (if the location surrounding by the military camp isn’t enough) there is a bank vault within a deep basement of the building that has a 250 ton door marking its entrance.

Source

2. Cheyenne Mountain

This is also in the United States, located just outside of Colorado Springs, CO. It is the command center and control, communication and the intelligence center for both the United States Space Command missions and the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD). Built at the height of the Cold War, the facility is said to be sturdy enough to survive a multimegaton nuclear detonation within 1 nautical mile (1.9km) of it’s center. It has blast doors that each weigh, individually, 25 tons.

Source

3. Haven Co

Located in the Sealand in the North Sea, about six miles off the coast of Britain, this location is a company base founded in 2000. The company provides data protection. The only way you can get in is if you are an authorized staff member, an investor in the company or you are a Royal Family member. Although services for HavenCo ceased without explanation in 2008, it’s an example of the type of “island data haven” that is very secure do to it being SO HARD to get to traditionally.

Source

4. Area 51

The famed stories be true or not, this area in the remote deserts of Las Vegas is more than just strange. It is also one of the most secure locations on the planet. It is a United States military base ( a detachment from Edwards Air Force Base in CA) where no one knows what’s occurring, except those that work there and the President. Known by many names (Groom Lake, Dreamland, Paradise Ranch, etc.) Area 51 is believed to be a testing ground for advanced and experimental aircraft.

Source

5. Air Force One

One of the most well built planes in the world and what many consider the world’s most secure moving location, Air Force One has plenty of security. The United States President travels in a modified Boeing 747-200B series aircraft. It has the world’s most advanced flight avoidance, air-to-air defense, and electronics technology packages available anywhere in the World, all for the protection of the Commander-in-Chief and his entourage.

Source

6. ADX Florence Prison

The Administrative Maximum Facility (ADX for short) is a supermax prison (for men) in Colorado housing the baddest of the bad. These criminals are considered the most dangerous cons in the US and has earned the prison the nickname of “Alcatraz of the Rockies.” Described by one former ADX warden as “a cleaner version of hell”, security measures at the prison include attack dogs guarding the area between the prison walls and 12 ft. high razor wire fences, 1,400 remotely controlled steel doors, motion detecting laser beams, pressure pads and cameras. Current residents of the prison include infamous “Shoe Bomber” Richard Reid, 9/11 terrorist mastermind Zacarias Moussaoui, and Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols among many, many others.

Source

7. The 1960’s Bar

Located 100 feet underground within Britain’s secret subterranean Burlington bunker complex in Wiltshire, England, the 1960’s Bar is a recreation of a pub popular with British Government officials. This top secret base was first constructed during the Cold War and designed to be a refuge for the higher-ups to reconstruct Britain in the event of a nuclear attack…needless to say they figured they would need a few pints to wait out the radiation.

Source

8. Bold Lane

Located in Derby, England, this car park is multi-story stronghold for 440 cars. First conceived and designed by an agricultural engineer after he had the window of his car smashed and his radio stolen while in an airport parking structure. Sophisticated security measures include CCTV cameras, panic buttons, bar-code scanning entry doors, and advanced sensors controlled by a central computer that detect any and all movements of each car. Although, at over $30 dollars an hour, keeping your auto safe in the UK isn’t cheap.

Source

9. Deposed Iraqi Leader Saddam Hussein’s Baghdad Bunker

The 2,150 square-yard bunker was originally designed to withstand the blast of a nuclear bomb and house 50 people. Located nearly 100 feet underground, security measures for the Dictator’s refuge included three-ton Swiss-made doors, 5ft-thick walls, a 6ft-thick steel-reinforced concrete ceiling, and two escape tunnels. The bunker survived seven American dropped bunker busters and 20 cruise missles during the war. Unfortunately, it couldn’t survive looting and was picked almost completely clean during the last days of the war by Iraqi soldiers.

Source

10. Granite Mt. Mormon Church Records Facility

The records storage of the Mormon Church is a massive vault encased in rock at Granite Mountains, Utah first opened in 1965. Armed guards waving metal detector wands usher visitors into a concrete bunker before swinging open metal gates to a tunnel entrance. Excavated 600 ft inside the mountain, the vault features state-of-the-art environmentally controlled document storage chambers as well as administrative offices, shipping and receiving docks, a processing facility and a restoration laboratory for microfilm.

Source

These are just a sampling of some of the world’s most SECURE locations. With the near daily unrest that occurrs even in developed countries today, there has been a lot of discussion about how secure any location really is. However, chances are good that if you are deep within these systems, you will be safe at least for some time.

The First Zombie-Proof House

From: http://all-that-is-interesting.com/

Somehow, ritual drunk-conversation concerning team captains for the apocalypse has become a major part of the lives of 20-somethings. Having been matured in the Grandaddy-crowned masterpiece film (put “A.M. 180” on and forget that you have a job), 28 Days Later, we’re all a little too ready to deal with the 2012 of our dreams.

“The Safe House,” designed by KWK Promes, starts to get eerily close to something I could work with, if say 200 bludgeoned members of the undead army came over to eat their way into borrowing some sugar.

“The most essential item for our clients was acquiring the feeling of maximum security,” begins the designers’ website in the summary of the structure. Who wouldn’t feel safe in a concrete rectangle that folds in upon itself to become completely sealed? Even the windows are covered with a slab of concrete when the structure is on nap time.

The house, with its movable walls, has only one entrance, which is located on the second floor after crossing a drawbridge. Seems like the perfect opportunity to use a flamethrower and defend the life of your family, while stylishly nesting in a piece of architectural elitism.

Taiwanese Animation: TSA’s Enhanced Security Spurs US ‘Airport Rage’

Hilarity ensues

High-Tech Combo Could Yield "Theft-Proof" Car

By Nelson Ireson Editor

From: http://www.thecarconnection.com/

August 23rd, 2010 GPS tracking, cell-network tracking, immobilizers, and secure key fobs are all common these days, but what if you were to roll all of the anti-theft technology available on the market into a single car? Would it be possible to theft-proof it? This infographic attempts to answer that question. The proposed "theft proof" car packs in everything but the cops themselves. Combining GPS tracking, GSM cellular remote fuel cutoff and communication, biometric secure ignition tech, a keyless alarm system, a passive immobilizer, ultrasonic interior monitoring, and a radio-frequency transmitter to signal the car's location to police, the "theft proof" car certainly looks very, very had to steal at the least. There are banks that would be easier to rob and get away from. In addition to the high-tech proposal, the infographic contains some key stats about car theft in the U.S., so spend a few minutes and figure out if it's worth the trouble to make your car a mobile anti-theft command center. Then let us know what you think in the comments below. Follow the jump below to see the full infographic. Research by Home Security.net [Home Security

Source: MotorAuthority.com

'Theft proof' car graphic

Enlarge Photo

GPS tracking, cell-network tracking, immobilizers, and secure key fobs are all common these days, but what if you were to roll all of the anti-theft technology available on the market into a single car? Would it be possible to theft-proof it? This infographic attempts to answer that question.

The proposed "theft proof" car packs in everything but the cops themselves. Combining GPS tracking, GSM cellular remote fuel cutoff and communication, biometric secure ignition tech, a keyless alarm system, a passive immobilizer, ultrasonic interior monitoring, and a radio-frequency transmitter to signal the car's location to police, the "theft proof" car certainly looks very, very had to steal at the least. There are banks that would be easier to rob and get away from.

In addition to the high-tech proposal, the infographic contains some key stats about car theft in the U.S., so spend a few minutes and figure out if it's worth the trouble to make your car a mobile anti-theft command center. Then let us know what you think in the comments below.

Follow the jump below to see the full infographic.

Research by Home Security.net

[Home Security

Top 8 Best And Free Antivirus Software For Windows 7

by Yogesh Mankani

from: http://savedelete.com/best-free-windows7-antivirus-software.html

Having done with the top 10 best free antivirus software for year 2010 two months before which was appreciated by our readers and downloaded best antivirus software according to their needs.

I switched from Windows Vista to Windows 7 some time before as I was pretty annoyed by the slow speed of Vista. And believe me Windows 7 is really brilliant operating system that I am waiting for long enough from Windows team. It is not only fast but the glossy looks, default sounds and themes make it more awesome.

But we all know that as earlier Windows OS versions, Windows 7 is also prone to virus and spyware attacks. And to stay free from viruses, it the most basic and fundamental task of any Windows user to find the antivirus software programs. So, I thought to research best antivirus software for Windows 7 and end up with some really great options that provided maximum security against viruses, malwares and several other threats.

Antivirus software listed below are fully compatible with Windows 7 – 32 and 64 OS and available freely on the internet for single and non-commercial use.

So, have a look on SaveDelete’s assorted list of Top 8 best and free antivirus software for Windows 7 to keep your computer safe against various virus threats and hackers.

1) Microsoft Security Essentials : Microsoft Security Essentials provides real-time protection for your home PC that guards against viruses, spyware, and other malicious software. Microsoft Security Essentials is a free download from Microsoft that is simple to install, easy to use, and always kept up to date so you can be assured your PC is protected by the latest technology. For more details and how to download MSE, you can check our article totally dedicated on MSE.

2) Avast Free Antivirus : avast! antivirus software is available for free and commercial use. It provides complete virus protection for your computer. Antivirus engine is complemented by anti-spyware, firewall and antispam modules to protect you against phishing schemes, identity theft and internet-distributed web viruses. Automatic updates for greater user convenience and safety.

3) AVG Free Antivirus : AVG has been around in the Antivirus market from ages and gained lot of loyal users to their kitty. They also provide upgraded version which is very costly but I believe that their free Antivirus program is great for users having personal computers. AVG user interface is pretty simple and it takes a minute to install on your computer.

4) Avira AntiVir Personal : One of the simple to use and light Antivirus software in the market. It works perfectly fine to detect virus, spyware, rootkit threats. The best part of Avira is that it is quiet outstanding in terms of finding malware. Few false positives about Avira is that it does not inlude E-mail scanner in free version, but if you open any infected E-mail, it comes again into action.

5) Panda Cloud Antivirus : The first free cloud antivirus against viruses, spyware, rootkits and adware. Panda Antivirus Beta3 supports Windows 7 (32 and 64bit). . The antivirus carries out BackgroundScan by deactivating many unnecessary operations.

6) Comodo Firewall + Antivirus : Comodo Firewall and Antivirus is now Comodo Internet Security.Comodo Internet Security 4.0 includes a built-in sandbox which combines file system/registry virtualization and least-privileged user account principle in order to combat unknown malware.

7) ClamWin Free Antivirus : ClamWin is a Free Antivirus program for Microsoft Windows 7 / Vista / XP / Me / 2000 / 98 and Windows Server 2008 and 2003. It comes with an easy installer and open source code. Please note that ClamWin Free Antivirus does not include an on-access real-time scanner. You need tomanually scan a file in order to detect a virus or spyware.

8 ) Free eScan Antivirus Toolkit Utility : eScan Antivirus Toolkit 12.x is compatible with Windows 7 – 32 & 64-bit OS. eScan Antivirus Toolkit is a FREE utility that enables you to scan and clean Viruses, Spyware, Adware and any other Malware that may have infected your computer. The eScan Antivirus Toolkit requires no installation and can be run directly from anywhere, on your computer, USB Drive or from a CD ROM. It can also be run even if you already have other antivirus software installed on your computer.