OneCare Fails Second Antivirus Test
Windows Live OneCare has once again come up with a failing grade, as it was disclosed Monday the program had not passed a virus test by the AV Comparatives organization.
The failure means that Microsoft will not receive any type of certification from the group. It was the only antivirus program to fail - two others received a "standard" rating, and 14 received either an "advanced" or "advanced+" rating.
According to the results, OneCare detected 82.4 percent of the 500,000 viruses it was subjected to, far worse than any of its major competitors. The next closest was a program called "Dr. Web," which scored an 89.3 percent rating.
Leading the pack were G DATA Security's AntiVirusKit at 99.5 percent, AEC's TrustPort at 99.4 percent, and AVIRA's AntiVirus PE Premium at 98.9 percent. Worse yet for Microsoft, the application failed to receive certification as it missed the minimum requirements.
This was the second test Windows Live OneCare has failed within a month. In February, Virus Bulletin refused to allow Microsoft to carry the VB100 logo because it could not detect 100 percent of a selected battery of common "in the wild" viruses.
Microsoft said it would provide further information on the review of its software at the time, however as of Tuesday, it yet had to provide an explanation of OneCare's poor performance.
One of OneCare's biggest faults was its detection of polymorphic viruses. This means that viruses that change their configuration likely have a good chance of making it through the antivirus software's safety net.
The Redmond company says it is looking into why it failed both tests, and would see if there was anything it could learn from those results. However, it defended itself by mentioning OnceCare carries both the ICSA Labs and West Point Checkpoint certifications.
Other problem areas were script viruses and malware, of which OneCare detected only 67.6 percent.