It’s that time of year again when we see antivirus companies releasing their 2013 range of products. Russian firm Kaspersky Lab is first out of the blocks with the release of its new flagship consumer products: Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 Premium Security Suite and Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2013 Essential Protection Solution.

Both products are fully compatible with the soon to be released Windows 8 operating system and include a range of new features in response to the ever-changing threat landscape.
 

Automatic Exploit Prevention technology was designed to address some of the most sophisticated threats – those exploiting vulnerabilities in popular software. Exploits have long become the cybercriminals’ weapon of choice for performing online attacks known as ‘drive-by downloads’ - when a user gets infected just by visiting a certain webpage.

 

Automatic Exploit Prevention protects Kaspersky Lab’s customers against these types of exploits, including those that utilise so-called zero-day vulnerabilities. The latter are among the most dangerous, infecting the system using unknown or unpatched security flaws in popular software.

 

Kaspersky Lab believes that based on their experience in IT security, the Automatic Exploit Prevention technology is able to recognise unauthorised activity by an exploit without blocking the normal operation of a potentially vulnerable program such as your web browser, document viewer etc.

 

Users of the new version of Kaspersky Internet Security will also enjoy complete protection for their online purchases and online banking transactions, thanks to the Safe Money feature.

 

Safe Money technology contains a diverse set of protection methods for when you deal with real money online. Such activity may include making purchases online, working with an electronic payment system like PayPal, or accessing your bank account from your computer.

 

Here is how it works:

?      Switches automatically to special “Safe Browser” mode when you visit banking websites; this isolates your payment operation from other online activities to ensure your transaction is not monitored

?      Activates automatically when visiting most common payment websites, and you can easily add your own bank or shopping website to the list

?      Checks the authenticity of the payment website itself to ensure the site isn’t compromised or a fake

?      Safe Money evaluates the security status of your computer, and warns about significant threats that should be addressed prior to making payments

?      Virtual Keyboard ensures tamper-proof entry of your password or credit card number

 

Both Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 and Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2013 solutions share the new antivirus engine, which offers better detection of all types of malicious programs, including the most complex samples. Particularly, specific methods have been introduced to better fight complex and targeted threats by neutralising attempts to embed malicious code into core system processes.

 

There are also smaller and faster database updates thanks to certain parts of the antivirus databases being transferred to the cloud-based Kaspersky Security Network.

 

To further protect users from phishing websites, both products now feature a new anti-phishing module that features automatic updates and improved heuristic detection of websites that try to steal your password and other valuable data. Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 also features a new anti-spam engine, providing the most reliable detection of unwanted messages in your email account.

 

Virtual Keyboard, designed to protect the most sensitive data against keyloggers when in Safe Money mode, has been bolstered with another technology called Secure Keyboard which utilises a special keyboard driver to prevent malware from logging keystrokes.

 

Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 and Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2013 are fully compatible with the new Windows 8 operating system from Microsoft. Kaspersky Lab offers full protection for Windows 8 users, with enhanced security for applications in the new touch-friendly interface and support for all the new safety features of the operating system itself.

 

The new Kaspersky Now application gives Windows 8 users a quick overview of their PC’s security status and makes it possible to launch key features of Kaspersky Anti-Virus and Kaspersky Internet Security directly from the new user interface. This app is available free of charge in the Windows Store.

 

 

Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 is available locally from approximately R416 for a license for one PC, to R535 for licenses for three PCs, while Kaspersky Lab Anti–Virus 2013 is available from approximately R306 (1 PC) to R416 (3 PCs).

 

To learn more about the new products, visit the Kaspersky Lab website:

 

Kaspersky Internet Security 2013: http://www.kaspersky.co.za/internet-security

Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2013: http://www.kaspersky.co.za/anti-virus