Antivirus software is an endpoint product that watches a laptop or server and blocks programs it classifies as infectious before they run.
It is the installed product on the machine, with updates, a console, and a quarantine, rather than only the habit of scanning one installer.
How it works
On a company laptop the product sits in the background, checks files as they open, and receives new detections from the vendor during the day.
An administrator can see which laptops are behind on those updates and which files were held.
When the product is current and not disabled, it reduces the chance that an infectious program starts during ordinary work.
It can also slow a machine or stop a specialist tool, so the company needs an owner who can tune it without turning it off for everyone.
Concrete examples
- A sales laptop blocks a program that arrived in a compressed mail attachment before the salesperson can open it.
- A server console shows three branch laptops that have not received detections for more than a week.
- A designer's machine holds a specialist viewer in quarantine until an administrator confirms the vendor and releases it.
Protective measures
- Assign an owner for the product and require that owner to notice laptops that stopped updating.
- Turn the real time watch on for standard laptops, and document any machine that must be an exception.
- Test a new detection update on a small group before you send it to the laptops that run the factory floor.
- Forbid staff from uninstalling the product, and investigate a laptop that reports the product as switched off.