On Monday, AVG announced the release of AVG Anti-Virus and AVG Internet Security 9.0, with enhancements to both scanning speed and protection. In addition to the protection and scanning engine improvements, AVG said that version 9 will include identity theft protection, thanks to a partnership with Intersections Inc.
AVG launched version 9.0.(IMG:AVG)
The announcement of AVG 9 was expected for some time now. The announced performance and protection improvements will come from the merger of several layers of security including signatures, whitelisting, behavioral, and cloud-based threat detection.
The new anti-Virus and anti-Spyware scanning is said to be 50-percent faster, depending on system configuration. Moreover, AVG said that version 9 shaves 10-15 percent off boot times and memory consumption.
AVG has integrated the Resident Shield, Firewall, and Identity Protection modules, so they can share detection-related information between them, which is said to improve the software’s performance when it comes to detecting and removing Malware. While merging the various modules, they have also lowered the number of permission notices for half.
Covering the browser, LinkScanner was also improved for version 9, adding Phishing detection, which used various internal checks and cloud-based detection. With all these changes, AVG’s look has been altered as well, with the intention to improve usability.
The big announcement however is the inclusion of the AVG Identity Theft Recovery Unit (ITRU). The Identity Theft Recovery Unit is a service that will provide AVG customers in the US who have been a victim of identity theft with support from a team of identity theft recovery experts who will help resolve issues.
The kicker is that this service is free. This is because of a partnership AVG has with Intersections Inc, a company that deals with consumer identity theft prevention. If an AVG user thinks they are a victim of identity theft, they call the ITRU and fraud specialists will first determine if they have, in fact, become a victim. If so, the specialists will obtain and review the customer’s credit reports and enroll them in daily credit file monitoring and alerts for six months.
In addition, they will work with the victim to cut through all the red tape, mindless bureaucracy, and piles of paperwork required by government agencies to re-establish their identity.
AVG 9 is commercially available now. AVG Internet Security 9 is $54.99 USD for one year or $81.99 USD for two years. AVG Anti-Virus is $34.99 USD for one year and $51.99 for two years. The free version of AVG 9 will be available later this month.
The Tech Herald will post a full review of AVG Internet Security 9 soon. In the meantime, if you want to checkout some screenshots, we’ve posted some on the next page.
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