Looking for feedback on replacing anti-virus software with Malwarebytes

[tomdkat]

Greetings my fellow Malwarebytes fans!  Now that Malwarebytes is being advertised as a replacement for anti-virus software, I'm seeking feedback from people who have replaced your anti-virus software of choice with Malwarebytes.  Has the transition been smooth?  Did you end up re-installing anti-virus software?

I'm about to purchase Malwarebytes premium with the intention of removing Bullguard.  In the past, I've always run Malwarebytes alongside some other anti-virus software.

Thanks in advance!

[reza_88]

After having it run for over a year I can now confidently say, yes, you can replace the anti-virus of your choice with Malwarebytes premium. As soon as I got my 2nd Laptop PC back in the February of 2018 I got annoyed by the proxy 127.0.0.1 virus which used to bar my internet browsers from connecting to internet. At that moment the only anti-virus support I had was the built in Windows Defender program. In that context, it is worth mentioning that I actually stopped running 3rd party anti-virus softwares since 2012, the built in Windows Defender would sort things out fine for me on my Windows 8.1 laptop. If a sudden mishaps occurred, Adwcleaner would fix it real fine. Unfortunately, as malwares becoming aggressive it seems at least to me having the built in Windows Defender software is not enough to give me a secured browsing experience. It could not remove that annoying virus which Malwarebytes had done. Since then I have purchased the Malwarebytes Premium which runs fine, without taxing the PC's RAM memory. 

The Malwarebytes support team and the forum here are both effectively supportive. I got myself into problems and experts like exile360 helped me solve the problem.

[exile360]

Greetings,

You should find the information in this FAQ entry as well as the diagram and information on this page to be helpful in deciding on how to run Malwarebytes.

Additionally, there are some other helpful resources that you may find useful such as this article which describes the issue with traditional script detection methods and highlights the reason that Malwarebytes focuses much more on a behavior based approach through technologies such as Exploit Protection for dealing with such threats/attacks/attack vectors.

That said, you could also keep Windows Defender active alongside Malwarebytes if you would prefer to have that AV layer still present on your system without consuming too many resources as it tends to be pretty lightweight and works well with Malwarebytes in real-time.  We have many users here on the forums who run this configuration without issues and by default, if Malwarebytes detects that Windows Defender is active, it will leave it active so that you may keep both running together.

You also might benefit from adding the Malwarebytes browser extension beta to your setup as it has the ability to block ads, trackers (for privacy when browsing), clickbait sites as well as new behavior based blocking for unknown/new tech support scam sites, phishing sites and several other categories of web based threats and works well with the Web Protection component in Malwarebytes 3.  It is available for Chrome (as well as other Chromium based browsers such as Microsoft's new Chromium based Edge replacement browser, SRWare Iron and Vivaldi) as well as Mozilla Firefox.  You can find out more as well as download the extension at the links below:

Chrome
Firefox

I hope this information helps and if there is anything else we might assist you with please don't hesitate to let us know.

Thanks

[Davidtoo]

The answer really comes down to what you want to protect imho.  My daughters use only Malwarebytes on their macs...and that likely is good enough.  But I would never rely solely on malwarebytes on my windows computer...why?  because I use my computer for work and not only would downtime cost me money, but would make available confidential information for my clients.  I can't and won't take that chance..so I use malwarebytes for secondary protection and rely on what I believe is the best security out there...kaspersky, with 30 levels of protection..far better than windows defender as far as I am concerned.  Kaspersky also finds and eliminates most email malicious links which malwarebytes does not check.  I.e., the issue is what is your risk if your security is breached.  If it is simply a matter of having to reinstall your operating system, may not be that much of a big deal.  If it is a matter of downtime and loss of confidential info...much bigger deal.  I learned my lesson years ago when I relied only on Symantec endpoint, and then did not update the virus engine as the years went by, only updating the signature database.......penny wise pound foolish...that cost me a lot.  Never again.

[tomdkat]

Thanks for the comments!  For years, I've been in the "use MBAM with another anti-virus application" camp and for the first time, I'm going to try Malwarebytes as a replacement of a third-party anti-virus application.  This will be installed on Windows 10 systems, so Windows Defender will still be running.   I was mostly interested in feedback from Malwarebytes users who have actually replaced a third-party anti-virus application with Malwarebytes Premium.   Your comments have been informative and I thank you for commenting!

[exile360]

I've been without a third party AV for several years now, relying on Malwarebytes as my primary protection, and while I do generally surf safely, I do actually occasionally press my luck going out into the riskier parts of the web to go 'hunting' for new threats and bad sites to report to the Malwarebytes Research team and even then, I still have yet to get a single infection (not even a single PUP) and the worst thing I've come across so far that actually got through was the occasional tech support scam site (though even those don't get through any more ever since I installed the MB browser extension beta I mentioned; it's very good at blocking those sites).

For years I used Kaspersky and later ESET, always with Malwarebytes, but now it's just Malwarebytes and MSE (Microsoft Security Essentials) and it's been that way for the past 3~4 years.

Edited April 24, 2019 by exile360

[AdvancedSetup]

I've used both Kaspersky and Norton along with Malwarebytes when it was on version 1.x and 2.x for my Wife's computer and a shared family computer. Once the 3.x version came out I was still on Norton for a few months as the Norton subscription was still valid. My wife and some of her friends are not very careful about what they open or click on so having Norton was needed. Once the subscription ran out on Norton I've been running it with Malwarebytes 3.x and Windows Defender. You can check the logs and Malwarebytes has stopped, removed hundreds of items over time. I finally broke down and put in a new SSD drive and installed Windows 10 for my wife's computer and it's been running Malwarebytes and Windows Defender now for the past couple of months with no issues. The computer seems to be well protected to me. I also backup all of the data to an external drive, then disconnect the drive.

Malwarebytes 3.x now includes MBAE which is an amazing protection layer

MBAE Exploits How they work

Malwarebytes Anti-Exploit in action

 

Let's get real. If you're not backing up your data and you're still using Google Chrome then you're just not serious about Privacy, Safety, and protecting your data. Malwarebytes is a fantastic program but you still need to back up your data and you still need to block scripts and Ads in your browser. 
If you're still using Google Chrome I would highly suggest you consider using Firefox instead. For more advanced users you might consider installing NoScript as well (it does have a higher learning curve though)

Help Secure your browsers

Please install uBlock Origin for your browsers to better protect your system

FireFox, Chrome, Opera , Safari, Microsoft Edge
AdBlock for Internet Explorer
How to use uBlock Origin to protect your online privacy and security | uBlock Origin tutorial 2018

This video tutorial above explains how to use uBlock Origin in advanced user mode and all the advanced settings to protect your online privacy and help prevent unwanted sites from changing your browser settings

Follow-up Reading

Everything you need to know about cybercrime
10 easy ways to prevent malware infection 
Keep your data backed up

Thank you for choosing Malwarebytes and tell your friends and family too. We're here to help.

Ron