I'm being told that my free avast licence is about to expire (it was something that could expire?), and that I must renew it. And for that, give my name and adress, and accept the user conditions. I checked them. It's basically "we get your personnal info each time you get an alert, and, okay, we try to not share it too much with others". Okay. Wait, no not okay.

I'm a bit allergic about this. Okay, I'm not totally sure the NSA, the scientologists, the Smersh and MacDonald are after me, but just in case, I have a policy of covering my tracks on the internet, I just don't like sharing personnal information much. In this case, I can't evaluate very well how objectively avoidable it would have been (though I see no technical reason to "register" with my name for a free product), and I'm not even certain of what I have accepted last time I installed avast. Maybe I overreact, out of principle. Maybe not.

This leads to the extremely boing question of : what free antivirus software you do use. And the possiubly more interesting optionnal question of : am I the only one who gets so ticklish when it comes to sharing personnal data online or allowing it to be automatically sent to some company by some software ?

(Just to give you an idea, for a very long time I couldn't bring myself to click on "yes" when skype asked me to agree on its terms before installation. Its terms being basically : every word you say is ours.)

Microsoft Security Essentials. I did not use any antivirus for a very long time for various reasons, but MSE is the first product I have seen that I don't have a single problem with. It does its thing, does not bother me at all, and it's absolutely free.

(Note that MSE does have a "share unknown files with us" and "anonymous use tracking" feature, but you can opt out.)

nothing is free in this world (okay well some stuff is)

you pay in a way for the software by supplying your information. now i doubt you will get spammed alot in your mailbox but if you don't like it there are alternatives,such as mse.
i don't know about avg.

actually come to think of it i was doing volunteer work at a local radio station. i used my own adress once to register a copy of avast.
i never gotten mail from avast or known companies besides the usual viagra stuff.

I'm using Kaspersky Internet Security since years .

And if you need a working address, there's also , [url=http://www.dispostable.com/]Dispostable and similar services. Very useful.

I agree with your not sharing info policy. I try only to share information with a company if it's directly relevant to the service they are providing me.

I've been using AVG a while, and they at least haven't told me about any nasty data collection. I haven't observed them doing any. It seems to be a perfectly good antivirus.

EDIT: Scratch that. AVG at some point introduced terms into their policy to say they totally scan your PC for everything and send it home. Time for a new Antivirus.

I completely agree with this.

I used AVG many years ago until I started to hate it. Switched to Avast! until I started to hate that. Switched to MSE a few years ago and haven't had issues.

All right. If I give up on avast (in 28 days), I might just go with MSE. That's already what I use on my tiny laptop, but I liked variety. And having a microsoft-independant thingy. Come to think of it, my different gripes or reservations about the antivirus softwares are more on symbolic aspects than actual practical ones with genuine consequences, I suppose. But even then, people's opinions help me change perspective on these aspects...

Get Comodo Internet Security. Totally free and have one of the best (free) firewall. Like every other AV they have their own Cloud Based Behaviour Analysis but you can opt out from that. And the program will ask for your permission first if it detect unknown program or submit file for false alert.

From the ULA:
1. Privacy.

11.1. Privacy Policy. Comodo shall follow the privacy policy posted on its website at <http://www.comodo.com/repository/privacy_agreement.html&amp;gt; when collecting and using information from you. Comodo may amend the privacy policy at any time by posting the amended privacy policy on its website.

11.2. Disclosure. Comodo will disclose information where required by a subpoena, interception order or other lawful process. Comodo may also disclose information when it believes that such disclosure is necessary to protect the rights or safety of others or to enforce, or protect Comodo’s rights under this Agreement.

11.3. Opt Out. You may opt-out of having information used for purposes not directly related to the Products by emailing a clear notice to optout@comodo.com <[url=mailto:optout@comodo.com]optout@comodo.com[/url]>. By clicking “I AGREE”, you affirmatively consent to receiving Comodo’s and its affiliates’ promotional material.

11.4. File Submission. This product may automatically submit to Comodo any files or programs that are identified as potential malware, including information on the actions taken by such files. These files are submitted to Comodo using the Sandbox Settings automatic submission function. The collected files could contain personally identifiable information that has been obtained in the file that is identified as potential malware file without your permission. Files of this type are being collected by Comodo only for the purpose of improving the ability of Comodo’s products to detect malicious behavior. Comodo will not correlate these files with any personally identifiable information. The automatic submission function may be deactivated by de-selecting this option in the General Settings.

Full Privacy policy (February 10, 2011):
http://www.comodo.com/repository/privacy-policy.php

Read first, see if you're fine with it.

Microsoft Security Essentials.
VirusTotal.com to check specific files.
Script blockers in your browser.

I actually went for two years just fine without an antivirus with script blockers only, getting software from sourceforge and torrents. The only source of risk was sticking my flash drives in someone else's computer and vice versa.

I use Avira Free Antivirus for years now, although it starts to be annoying by using pop-up adverts.

I just removed Avast in favor of MSE and it appears to have cleared up a seemingly unrelated problem I was having with The Witcher. In my opinion, aside from Avast's invasive information policy, it has gone downhill in quality over the years, much like AVG. That alone makes it worth replacing.
I've spent most of the last 3-4 years completely virus AND anti-virus free, just by relying on common sense practices and tools like script blockers. I only returned to anti-virus because of my new PC. Until I get more familiar with it and Windows 7, I can't trust my old common sense practices alone.

Avira always used annoying pop-up adverts, but now that they've decided that one type of annoying pop-up advert is not enough and added a second one, I can't recommend it anymore. I switched from Avira to MSE last week, partly because of the intrusive adverts, partly because Avira didn't prevent trojans and malware to invade my system more than once, and gave me lots of false alerts for perfectly fine and legit tools and games instead.

Can't say if MSE is any better yet, but at least it works more subtly.

Beware this program.

I tried it. It made my PC so sluggish it felt like I was trying to run Windows XP on a 486. It insisted on scanning everything, even stuff that I added to the exception list.